The Rebel
by Margaret Dean
Summary: A tale of the early days of Blue Mountain, and the only one of my ElfQuest stories to include characters from the original series. Originally published in Daystar Holt's fanzine PLAYELF, Issues 3,4, & 5.


**The Rebel**

_**by Margaret R. (Purdy) Dean**_

"_The young of my generation … the next … and the next… always turned to __**me**__ for guidance…. Why, then, did they rebel against my wisdom?" _—Lord Voll

Rynell was enjoying the view. The winter just past had seemed worthy of the Frozen Mountains. Even the Chosen Eight, of whom he was one, had seldom ventured from the hollows of their mountain refuge to brave the bitter cold. He had chafed at the confinement. But spring was here at last. From the high aerie where he stood he could see the river flowing free of its icy shackles, the thick trees on its banks shimmering with new green. The wind was cool and fragrant with the scents of growing things. Among the low, mounded hills of rock off to his right, threads of smoke rose from the humans' cookfires. They too were no doubt glad to leave the confines of their cave-homes and enjoy the strengthening sunlight.

A firm nudge at the back of his neck nearly staggered the slim elf, but it was only Thunderwing, his bond-bird, trying to groom him again. He could never quite make the giant hawk understand that his shaggy reddish hair was not some queer sort of feathers that needed to be preened into smoothness. And though his leather headband served to keep the unruly mane in some kind of order, he had to admit she had a point. Besides, he rather enjoyed the feel of that huge, tearing beak nibbling gently along the nape of his neck and around his ears. It was an affirmation of their bond that she, who could just as easily have snapped his head off, cosseted him as if he were one of her own fledglings.

When she finished with his hair and started in on the fur shoulders of his vest, however, Rynell firmly pushed the great bird's head aside with a mental admonishment that enough was enough. By way of apology he set to scratching the bony ridge that ran along the crest of her head. Thunderwing's eyes half-hooded and she churred with pleasure. Grinning, Rynell leaned into his task with both hands and had the satisfaction of hearing the note deepen. "Yes, my lovely one, my high flyer, we know what you like, don't we," he crooned softly. At the same time he opened his mind to awareness of hers—the fierce, bright hunter's instincts gentled and directed by their bond. Love and acceptance flowed from him, caressing her as surely as the hands that knew just the right spots to scratch. His grin softened to a dreamy smile as he shared her pleasure.

"Rynell?"

Lost in the rapport, Rynell had not heard the other elf come into the aerie. He glanced up, startled, to find the tall, elegant figure of Tyldak standing in the entranceway, feet in sunlight, face in shadow. It was difficult to see his expression thus, but Rynell thought he glimpsed a tightening at the corners of the other elf's mouth. It was no secret that Tyldak longed to be one of the Chosen Eight and ride the skies on a bond-bird of his own, but Lord Voll had passed him over. Rynell thought he knew why. Bonding with one of the giant hawks required a certain empathy that Tyldak lacked completely. Well, empathy or something—Rynell often suspected that some of the Eight, Kureel for instance, controlled their mounts more by force than persuasion. In either case Tyldak didn't have it. But his yearning for flight was almost palpable and he was often to be found in or around the aeries. Rynell and some of the other Chosen gave him rides sometimes when they could find an excuse to do so. Tyldak's pride would not allow him to ask outright, but it usually did not take much persuasion to get him to accompany a rider. Rynell wondered if that was why Tyldak was here now. It was a beautiful day. By the first egg, he wouldn't need much of an excuse himself to go soaring out of here!

He smiled at the other elf. "Were you looking for me, Tyldak?"

Tyldak did not return his smile. His expression was troubled and slightly annoyed. "Yes, I was. It's a rather odd thing—" The frown on his face deepened. "The humans are asking for you."

"They're what?" Rynell straightened, staring at Tyldak, then glanced briefly down at the humans' dwellings. "Why?"

"How should I know? They didn't say. That is," Tyldak went on as the other's penetrating hazel eyes, set above prominent cheekbones, fixed on him again, "not that I could make out with that impossible accent of theirs."

"Try wrapping your tongue around their language for a change and you'll find out what 'impossible' is," Rynell told him rather sharply. "But haven't you any idea of why they should ask for me? They've never done such a thing before."

"Well, it was something to do with that one you visit sometimes—Kirok? Kurak?"

"Karuk! Was he there?"

"No, but I gathered that he is the one who wants to see you. I couldn't catch any more than that. Vareel may be able to tell you more. He sent me up here to get you."

_Trust Vareel to know where I'd be,_ Rynell thought. _Why didn't he just send?_ "Well, you've got me," he told Tyldak, "and if Karuk wants me I'd better go. He's a pretty important man these days, you know, elder of the tribe and all that." He gave Thunderwing a final pat and strode past Tyldak, who was still frowning.

"Important or not, I don't see that a human has any right to—"

"He is my friend, Tyldak. And he could say with some truth that I've neglected him of late. I don't believe I've seen him since autumn. Still," Rynell continued as the two elves left the aerie and started down the long flight of stairs leading to the entrance hall, "I can't see him sending for me just because he missed my conversation. I hope nothing's wrong." Worry hastened his steps. After a moment walking seemed too slow; he lifted into the air and skimmed quickly down the curving stairway without touching it. Tyldak, disgruntled, did not attempt to keep up with him.

The entrance tunnel was open when Rynell arrived in the hall, letting in a draft of cool spring air. He hurried toward it, but paused momentarily when he noticed that Doreki was on door duty, seated in the niche above the opening. He and the pretty blonde rockshaper had been lovemates for several years.

"Hullo, Doreki," he called up to her. "Do you know what this is all about?"

"Hello, love, your hair's mussed again," she commented irrelevantly, smiling down at him. "Been with your other lovemate, I see. No, I've no idea. I thought it was a regular gifting party until Tyldak came in to fetch you. They're right outside."

"Thanks." Rynell strode through the opening and down the short tunnel beyond it until he emerged into the open air. A little way down the slope stood a group of figures, three humans and two elves. He recognized the humans as one of the tribal elders, Karuk's daughter Saya, a plump, dark-haired woman, and her mate Bero, who clutched a signal pipe in one large hand. With them were Vareel and his lovemate Twillah. Vareel turned toward Rynell as soon as he stepped out of the tunnel, concern plain to read in his grey eyes.

Vareel was Lord Voll's sister-son and strongly resembled him. He and Rynell had grown up together under the Glider Lord's protective wings after Rynell's parents were killed defending the tribe from a pack of wild dogs, during the Wandering Years before the Gliders settled in Blue Mountain. Vareel's parents were also dead; Voll treated them both as the sons he'd never had. For their part they were closer than brothers. Rynell could tell already that the news was not good and that Vareel wished he did not have to burden his friend with it. That was probably why he had not sent to Rynell directly and had asked Tyldak to fetch him instead of coming himself. If his sense of honor would not allow him to keep bad news from Rynell, at least he could delay it as long as possible.

But Rynell would delay no longer. He walked quickly up to the group and addressed the humans in their own tongue. "You sent for me. I have come. What do you wish of me?" His concern for Karuk made his voice sharper than he intended. He saw the humans flinch away. Only the elder, a stooped, white-haired man with a face like cracked leather, dared to meet his eyes.

"Forgive us, Honored One," he said in a voice rough with age, "but our Elder Karuk is dying. His last wish is to see you before he passes on."

"Dying!" The shock was almost physical. "Why? Who would harm him? Or is he ill?" He shot a glance at Twillah, who was a healer.

The old man shook his head. "It is his time. It comes for all of us, and Karuk has lived long. Will you come?"

_His time._ Rynell had known intellectually that all humans died, whether or not violence or disease claimed them, but he had never thought about it happening to Karuk. A part of him had seen his friend's face hollow and wrinkle, his dark hair turn thin and grey, his jutting nose become more prominent and bladelike. Yet the human's mind had remained clear and sharp; in their long talks together the elf had been able to forget the evidences of Karuk's mortality. Now it seemed the matter could no longer be ignored. "Of course I will come," he told the humans. "You were right to ask for me," he added and saw all three of their faces brighten. Saya's ample bosom heaved in a sigh of relief.

Rynell felt Vareel's hand on his shoulder. **Do you want me to come with you?** his soulbrother sent to him privately. **Or perhaps Twillah—**

**Thank you, my brother, but no. I doubt there is anything either of you can do. Karuk is my friend. This is something I must face alone.** He turned to the humans. "Let us go to Karuk."

He had to fight the urge to glide or at least stride ahead as the three humans led him at what seemed a snail's pace down the trail to their village. Walking a path he'd trod many times before, preoccupied with thoughts of his friend, he paid little attention to the many stares that followed his slim form past the mouths of several caves till he reached the one belonging to Karuk's family. Saya drew aside the skin that hung in the doorway, then stood back for him to enter. Stooping slightly, for the doorway was low, Rynell went in.

Apart from what few rays of daylight got past the door-hide, the cave was lit by a single fitful flame from a crude lamp, a wick pushed into a bowl of animal fat. As his eyes adjusted to the dimness he saw Karuk lying on a pile of soft grasses covered with hides, a fur blanket thrown over his legs. Rynell was shocked by the human's thinness. Karuk had always been a lean man, but now he seemed little more than a skeleton held together with leathery brown skin. His breathing was so shallow that for a moment Rynell thought he was already dead. But Karuk had detected his entrance. When he turned his head to look at the elf, his dark eyes, though sunken, were clear and held no pain.

"You came." Karuk's voice had thinned too; it sounded as if it came from a long way off.

Rynell crossed the cave and knelt by the human's rude bed. "Of course I did. Could you doubt it? Well, perhaps you could. I have not been to see you since—"

A bony brown hand moved slightly. "It does not matter. The winter was not a good time. I was ill—I would have been poor company. I could not even rise from my bed to watch the great birds fly out. That was hard. But the new green has come and now it is my time to fly."

"What do you mean?"

"Ah. I was hoping you could tell me that." Karuk was silent for a while. Rynell waited, wondering if the human was preparing to explain his last remark. But when the old man spoke again his words seemed unconnected to what had gone before. "I remember when your people first came here. I was a youth then, not far from my manhood. Do you remember?"

"Yes," Rynell answered, seeing in his mind's eye the tall young human Karuk had been, dark and keen-faced with a lively intelligence in his glance. It seemed only seasons ago. It seemed centuries. How young had he himself been then?

"Some said you were demons come to defile the holy mountain. But I knew, as my grandfather knew, and others of the elders, that no demon was ever so fair. So fair…" Karuk raised a shaking hand toward Rynell's face. He was too weak to lift it far, but the elf took it gently in his own and laid the dry, withered fingers against his cheek. Karuk sighed. His eyes closed; Rynell wondered if he had gone to sleep. But after a moment they flickered open and the human drew his hand away. "They call me Speaker to Spirits, did you know that?" A faint note of amused pride colored his voice. "It is the name they gave me when I was made Elder because of my friendship with the Honored Ones of the Mountain. The wisdom I have gained from you will live on to benefit my tribe."

"I have learned much from you too, my friend."

The old eyes widened. "Is it so?"

"Of course. Through our friendship you have let me see the world as you see it. If I could not learn from that I would be dull indeed."

Karuk gave a dry little chuckle. "A fine new name to take with me on my journey: Teacher of Spirits! But I never thought you were a spirit…" His eyes searched the elf's face. "And yet … do you know why I sent for you?"

"Because you wanted to see me again before you died. To say farewell…" Rynell answered uncertainly.

"All that, yes. A man should bid his friends farewell if he has time. I have already taken leave of my family and my tribefolk. But you … I wanted to ask you something…" His eyes roved from side to side.

"What is it?" Rynell prompted gently.

"What becomes of me now?" the human whispered intensely. "Where does the journey lead? What is beyond—" He gestured vaguely with a trembling hand.

Rynell shook his head slowly. "Beyond death? My friend, I know less than you do. My people—our time does not come for us, as you say, though we can be slain. Even then… My parents were killed far from here, yet at times I think I feel their presence, though I have never been sure. But humans? I do not know. What do your legends say?"

"Our legends say that we pass into the spirit world, where if we can brave the dangers that await us, there may be happiness. But none have ever returned to tell of it." Karuk's eyes fixed on Rynell's face again. "Of late I have heard another tale: that when we die we go to dwell with the immortal bird spirits in their holy mountain."

"What!" Rynell was really shocked. "Where did you get _that_ tale? Or are you making it up?" Karuk's talent for deadpan fabrication alternately baffled and amused the guileless elf. He peered at the human suspiciously. Karuk's eyes glittered with unvoiced laughter, but he did not seem to be fabricating now.

"I have heard it said. What, isn't it true?"

"My friend, I only wish it were. Then I wouldn't have to lose you." The elf's eyes glittered too, but with tears.

"I never thought you were a spirit," Karuk said again, "but I never thought to ask what you really are."

Rynell spread his hands helplessly. "I don't know what to tell you. I could give you a word in our language, but what good would that be? It would have no more meaning than you could put into it yourself. Ah, I'm not exactly a fountain of answers today, am I? I'm your friend, Karuk. That's what's important. Other names don't matter."

"Rynell—my friend," the human murmured, lingering over the words in farewell. Then he said softly, "Would you share my last moments, Rynell my friend?"

Rynell drew in breath sharply, surprised, almost fearful. "You mean—in your mind? You wish it?" Only once before, frustrated at the clumsiness of words, had the elf attempted with Karuk's consent to reach the human's mind directly, using the same gift of empathy that allowed him to bond with his bird. It was a disquieting experience for both of them. Rapport with the relatively uncomplicated bird mind had not prepared Rynell for contact with a mind intelligent yet alien in structure and patterns of thought. As for Karuk, the sudden awareness of a touch in what seemed his inmost soul roused a kind of primal terror. Something dark and savage had risen up in him howling to fling the intruding presence from his mind. Since then neither of them had dared to try again. But now—

"I am afraid," Karuk whispered hoarsely. "A man should face death bravely, they say, but I am afraid. Perhaps if I am not alone while I wait for the Dark One…"

"You will not be alone," Rynell assured him, though his heart pounded with apprehension. What might be the effect on his spirit of witnessing a human's death from within? By main force he pushed the negative feelings aside, lest they communicate themselves to Karuk, as he took the old man's head on his knees. Laying his fingertips lightly on Karuk's temples, he cautiously opened his awareness to the human's mind.

Once again he felt fear, but this time it was not directed at him. Nor was it the wild, howling thing that had cast him out before. That had been stilled when pain ceased, he sensed. What remained was a child who cried at being alone in the dark—alone with whatever might lurk in the dark. Instinctively he wanted to soothe that fear, but he hesitated. Would that not be an intrusion, a violation? Then as awareness came clearer he realized it was not so. The fear itself was a violation, though he was not certain why. It did not matter. As he had once done for the newly hatched Thunderwing, terrified and confused at the strangeness of the world outside the egg, he took up the trembling soul in a mental embrace.

**Do not fear. I am here. Nothing will harm you.**

Enveloped in that warmth and strength, Karuk's soul ceased to tremble. Something that clung mindlessly to the familiarity of physical life relaxed its hold. Rynell felt the soul he cradled turn in a direction he could not see. Then it vanished like a blown lampflame. Or no, it was not like that. It was like a bird flying free of a cage with no opening, finding a way out at right angles to reality.

Had he imagined its cry of joy as it escaped?

Rynell's spirit hung alone in emptiness for a moment. Then awareness of the physical world came back to him. He was kneeling with Karuk's head in his lap, bowed over the human's stilled face. Light was thrown over it suddenly as the door-hide parted.

"Honored One?" It was Saya, hesitant, apprehensive, but no longer able to hold back her need to know what was happening.

"Karuk is dead," he told her quietly. "It is all right. You can come in." As the woman stepped into the cave and moved slowly toward him, he gently raised the head of Karuk's empty shell and laid it back on the furs. "Fare well, my friend, Teacher of Spirits," he murmured, too low for Saya to hear.

"Ah!" exclaimed the Elder's daughter. "He looks so peaceful."

"He died without fear," Rynell told her. Lost in his own thoughts, he did not see her awed stare.

# # # # #

The sun's rays were slanting toward evening as Rynell walked back along the trail to Blue Mountain. The steep path up to the entrance was in shadow. The tunnel was sealed, but his quick sending to the doorkeeper soon prompted the stone to part like soft clay prodded with a finger and let him enter the hollow mountain. Doreki had been relieved, he noticed, her place taken by Ekerrin, a dark-haired rockshaper whom he didn't know too well. He did not seem inclined to conversation, which was all to the good as far as Rynell was concerned. Casual talk was the last thing he felt in the mood for at the moment. He nodded his thanks to the doorkeeper, then started up the stairs to the aeries. Thunderwing was undemanding company and he needed to think.

But at a branching of the long stairway he heard descending footsteps. Light from a bobbing lantern gleamed on snowy hair and cast a long, cloaked shadow before it. "Ah, Rynell," said Lord Voll, "I am glad to see you have returned. I am just now going to the hall to dine. Will you join me?" At his gracious gesture Rynell fell into step beside him. He knew Voll's ways pretty well; he suspected the Glider Lord had come this way on purpose to meet him. He further knew that Voll would not have pressed him had he declined the invitation, but he found he welcomed the older elf's presence. As they continued down the stairs side by side, followed by the silent lantern bearer, Voll said, "Vareel told me you had an unhappy errand this day."

"Yes," Rynell answered. "Karuk, my friend among the humans, has died." He paused, then added, "He was very old."

Voll nodded. "Unfortunate, then, but not unexpected. I grieve with you. Karuk—he was one of the last of the humans who saw us arrive here, was he not?"

"I believe he was. He spoke of that, and of other things." Rynell sighed. "I shall miss him. I never came away from a conversation with him without some new insight. It was like getting outside my own head. I wish now I had gone more often to see him, especially this past year. I can think of a million things I would have liked to discuss with him. But it is too late." He shook his head. "I suppose I never really admitted to myself that it ever would be too late."

"It is not an idea we need often concern ourselves with here," Voll agreed. "Here in our mountain there is time enough for everything."

Rynell felt tears starting in his eyes. "Not for him," he burst out. The constriction of his throat gave his voice a ragged edge. "He was—transitory, mortal, and I did not let myself see it soon enough. Too late! Our time is like the river ceaselessly flowing, but a mortal life flows from a breakable vessel. If you do not taste of it while it is flowing it will all spill out and be gone, leaving you thirsty ever after."

"Perhaps it is wisest, then, not to cultivate a taste for that which lies in mortal vessels," the Glider Lord suggested. "Surely the river you mentioned is wide and deep enough for any thirst." He looked at the younger elf keenly. "How long has it been since you explored the potentialities within yourself?" They were passing through a large vaulted cavern. In the midst of it the form of a tree had been drawn from the living stone. Rockshapers were still at work on it, molding it into the visible embodiment of their imaginings. Voll paused to regard it and with an outstretched hand offered the sight to Rynell. "You know my dream, Rynell," he said, "to strengthen and preserve in my followers the powers of the Firstcomers and their ways. What of the powers within you?"

Rynell looked at him curiously. "What is there that you do not already know? I am of your Chosen. I glide. I bond with my mount. What else is necessary? And if there is more to my magic than that," he went on, remembering his last moments with Karuk, "I think the key to it does not lie within this mountain, but outside it. No, I don't think the river is enough for me, my lord."

Voll looked troubled, but did not ask him to explain further as they resumed walking. Presently he said, "This world has not been kind to us on the whole. It has diminished us, both in numbers and in power, and robbed us of much that we held precious." His gaze seemed to fix on the empty air before him. Rynell knew from previous conversations that the Firstborn was thinking with his customary yearning of his parents' tales of the Palace, that magical vessel that brought the High Ones to this world.

"Yet it is a beautiful world," he argued. "There is much to love in it and much to learn, if only we take the trouble to look, listen, feel." He glanced sharply at Voll. "My lord, how long has it been since you were outside? I know you have not ridden the skies since Starsweeper died—and Thunderwing was of her last clutch."

"It has not been necessary," Voll said with a dismissive wave of his hand. "I have you Chosen to ride out for me, to provide for our people. That is what you were chosen for. As for me, Rynell, I had full experience of the world outside during our Wandering Years. I saw it devour my parents and yours, my family and friends. I saw how it was changing those who survived. But here in this haven we can resist those changes. We can regain what we have lost. We can make Blue Mountain our own vessel of power, and in us the High Ones will live again!" A thrill underlay the Glider Lord's voice. The flame of his vision lit his face from within. Rynell was moved despite himself. To make a world for themselves alone, where friends did not die, where beauty was not transitory, where the vessel did not spill—could it be done?

Yet he remembered the flight of the caged bird that was the escape of Karuk's soul, the feeling he'd had that the human's death was indeed a passage, not an ending—perhaps even a beginning, the bird emerging from that cage with no opening, the egg. Change, progression, a seeking outward… Karuk was a human, though, his way sundered from Rynell's. What was right for him might not be right for the elf. _Do I wish for death?_ he asked himself. _Surely not!_ Yet suddenly the high-ceilinged passage they walked through seemed unbearably constricted; the whole weight of the rock above pressed in on him, a cage against whose walls the wings of his spirit beat wildly.

He had no chance to voice his feeling to Lord Voll. From the passage ahead came a high-pitched screech and a flutter of bright wings. "Petalwing see you! Petalwing find High-Highthing!" The Preserver darted around their heads and came to rest momentarily on top of the lantern pole. "Softdark Highthing say, you not come, food spoil, make all sick! Hurry, hurry!" It waved its tiny green arms frantically.

Both elves laughed and Rynell said, "It seems that not everything will await our leisure, my lord."

"It seems not," Voll answered, smiling. "Go tell Winnowill we are coming, Petalwing." The Preserver launched itself down the passage that led to the dining hall. The two elves followed its happy shrilling to where their fellows awaited them. For the moment Rynell was able to forget his griefs and troubles in the simple pleasures of food and friendship. Yet deep inside he knew that the conversation with Lord Voll was not finished and that its resolution would be no light matter.

# # # # #

The fleeing antelope herd far below was a group of moving brown spots on a rippling field of green. Rynell flattened himself along Thunderwing's broad feathered back, preparing for her stoop. Even at this height, he could sense, she had selected her prey, a young buck whose panicky sprint had separated it from its fellows. He gripped her leather harness with both hands, at the same time slipping his feet into straps farther along her back. The trick was to present as little wind resistance as possible.

They were falling. He ducked his head and slitted his eyes against the fierce rush of air. The ground leaped up at them. The racing antelope swelled rapidly in size. Then the sudden shock came that nearly took his breath away and the animal was tumbling over and over in the long grass. Thunderwing's scream of victory rang in her rider's ears and burst redly in his mind. As she recovered from her dive, skimming a few feet above the grass-tops, he sprang from her back, spear in hand. The antelope, its back broken by the blow of the great bird's clenched talons, was thrashing in the grass, trying fruitlessly to rise. Rynell ended its struggles with a quick thrust.

Thunderwing landed heavily nearby and immediately fixed an intent brown eye on him. "Skrrr?" she inquired.

"Greedy!" he chided her, but promptly set to work opening the carcass. The warm entrails went to the hungry bird; the meat and skin would provide food and clothing for the elves of Blue Mountain. Rynell noted with satisfaction that the spring grass was beginning to fatten the herd-beasts. This one would be better eating than the scrawny specimens their winter hunts had yielded. As he butchered his catch he heard Fogfeather's scream, then Stormcleaver's farther off. Vareel and Aleera had made their kills too. Quick work—with any luck they'd have time for a side trip before heading back to Blue Mountain.

He finished cleaning out the antelope carcass, then lashed the dangling head and legs to the body to make a compact bundle. With a call and an upflung hand he signaled to Thunderwing. She lurched into the air, flapping heavily; taking off from level ground was not easy for the huge birds. He waited till she gained some speed and altitude. Then he lifted the carcass over his head and whistled piercingly. Thunderwing banked and came winging back. Swooping low, she plucked the bundle from his hands with practiced skill. When she came around the second time the elf floated up to meet her. With her rider safely settled, the great bird climbed high above the rolling meadow, there to circle and wait. Soon they were joined by Fogfeather and Stormcleaver, similarly burdened.

**A fine hunt!** Vareel exulted.

**What about a swim?** suggested Aleera, anticipating Rynell's thought. **I swear the wretched beast took its revenge by bleeding all over me.** Agreement was reached among the three elves without need of further expression. As one the great birds swerved and headed in the direction of sun-goes-down, toward the shores of the Vastdeep Water. The meadowlands flowed swiftly under their wings, the pale green-brown carpet dotted here and there with darker clumps of trees.

**Look!** Vareel sent suddenly. **Humans!** Rynell looked down and saw a sizable scattering of hide shelters. Among them humans walked, conversed in twos and threes, tended cookfires, bent to various tasks. Leggy, yellowish-brown dogs rolled with skinny children in the dust or stole scraps when no one was watching. **Where did they come from?** Vareel wondered. **They weren't here before.**

**Probably from the north,** Rynell ventured. **The cold may have driven them downland. They wouldn't be the first,** he added, remembering the Wandering Years and how the snows seemed to pursue the shivering elf tribe southward.

**They do look hungry,** Aleera agreed. **Much scrubbier than our humans.**

**But fierce,** Rynell countered. **They've spotted us now. Look at that one shaking his spear! I wonder what he's thinking, seeing us fly over—or the birds, rather. I doubt he can see us at this distance.**

**We could fly closer,** Aleera suggested impishly.

**Let's not,** Vareel sent hurriedly. **Humans are—unpredictable. You're too young to remember, maybe, Aleera, but they're not all as friendly as the ones we know.** The white-haired elf's sending was edged with pain. Rynell knew his friend was thinking of his father Elmir, slain by hostile humans long ago. **Leave them be—it's best.**

The humans' camp fell rapidly behind as they flew onward. Soon the grassland gave way to forest. Finally the grey line of the sea appeared on the horizon. The sun was westering when they reached their favorite swimming spot, a sheltered cove ringed by cliffs with a small beach of white sand. The gulls inhabiting the cliffs shrieked at the gigantic invaders, wheeling indignantly, but the great birds ignored them. They rested and churred to each other while their riders eagerly shed their clothing and dived from the cliffs into the sea.

**Whoo! That's _cold_!** Aleera shot up several feet above the waves. Her dark hair had come loose from the knot she bound it in for flying. It streamed wetly over her white shoulders and down her back. Rynell trod water and grinned up at her.

"You just have to get used to it," he told her. With a lunge he grabbed her by the ankle and pulled her back down into the water. She plunged after him, bent on revenge. Soon all three of them were involved in a complicated three-dimensional game of touch-me-touch-you, sometimes below and sometimes above the surface. The gulls looked on and mewed their astonishment.

The water was cold, however, winter still recent in its memory. It was not long before the three left their game to lie side by side on the beach where the last of the afternoon sun could dry and warm them. Stretched out on his stomach with his head pillowed on his folded arms, warmed by the sun and by the presence of his friends on either side, and glowing with satisfaction at the success of the day's hunt, Rynell felt immeasurably content.

"This is the life," he sighed happily. "If only Voll could share this, perhaps he'd look on the world with a kinder eye. We should kidnap him someday and drag him out here—"

"—kicking and screaming—" Aleera put in.

"—and show him what he's missing," Vareel finished. "It won't work, Rynell. He's left mere physical pleasures too far behind him."

"Do you think so?" Rynell cocked an eyebrow. "What a disappointment for Winnowill!"

"Maybe that's why they've never Recognized," Aleera giggled.

"That's not so surprising. None of us have," Rynell said. Then, struck by his own words, he repeated in a lower voice, "None of us have."

"Of course we have," Vareel objected. "Where do you think we all came from? The Palace of the High Ones?"

"Nobody's Recognized recently," Rynell pointed out. "Not since Aleera and Aroree were born. And that was—when? Aleera, you were five when we came here, as I recall, and Aroree was born about a year after we settled in Blue Mountain. Since then," he frowned slightly, "nothing."

Vareel shrugged. "I don't see that it's anything to worry about. We've never bred fast. Give it time."

"Time, yes. Time enough for everything—that's what Voll said." Rynell fell silent, staring moodily out to sea where the sun was sinking in a welter of red and orange clouds. Suddenly he burst out, "Have you ever had the urge to fly and just keep flying? Out beyond—everything?"

Vareel raised himself up on one elbow and regarded his friend curiously. "Rynell, what has gotten into you today?" His voice softened. "Are you still thinking about Karuk?"

"In a way, I suppose. I've been thinking about a lot of things. But I haven't come to any conclusions yet." He sighed and got to his feet, brushing sand off his front. "We should be getting back. We won't be home before nightfall as it is." He looked around the cove one last time. "Perhaps we should bring them all out here," he muttered, "before it's too late." The other two looked at him questioningly, but he only shook his head as if to clear it and sprang into the air. "Didn't you say your clothes needed washing, Aleera?" he asked innocently, hovering over her.

"Don't you dare!" she shrieked, leaping after him, "or I'll throw you in clothes and all! Rynell!"

Laughing and chasing each other, the three elves floated to the top of the cliffs. There they dressed for riding once more and took to the air. But Vareel noticed that his friend was unusually silent as they flew homeward under the opening stars.

# # # # #

The moons had long risen when the three hunters returned at last to their aeries, but when he entered the chamber they shared, Rynell found Doreki still awake. Wrapped in a loose robe, she reclined on a fur-padded stone couch in front of her "garden," as she called it. One slender hand supported her head while the other reached out toward the stone forms she had drawn from the floor of the chamber. The power radiating from her fingers was almost visible. Directed by her will, the shapes slowly flowed and changed.

Rynell came up quietly behind her and put his hands on her shoulders. "Are you still up? It's late."

"Is it?" She tilted her head back and looked up at him with dreaming grey eyes. "I hadn't noticed. I was shaping," she added unnecessarily, turning her outstretched hand palm up.

"So I see. And what were you shaping?" he asked her. He looked at the garden of stone forms, knobbed or sinuous, graceful and grotesque. None had a shape he could recognize.

"Rock, silly!" she laughed.

He laughed too. "No, no, that's not what I mean. I should say, what are they supposed to be?"

When they first took this chamber for their own, Doreki's art had enriched it with images of the natural world. Their bed was watched over by a great stone bird and supported by the wings of two more, one at each end. A fountain welled in one corner, its basin ornamented with leaping fish and a comical frog perched on the rim. The torch brackets on the walls mimicked graceful four-fingered hands. The "garden" too had once been an ever-changing stage upon which forms of elves, of beasts and birds familiar and fantastical, frolicked among woods and fields and flowers that did everything but smell. But recently the familiar shapes had been simplified, abstracted, became only suggestions, till now Rynell could make no sense of them.

"They're not supposed to be anything," Doreki said. "They're shapes, the shapes hidden within the rock. You have to get inside it, listen to it, feel the shape forming—and then make it happen. It's harder than just making the stone go the way you want it to, but it's ever so much better. It makes me feel like part of the rock, part of the whole mountain." She closed her eyes and smiled blissfully.

Rynell cupped her face in his hands. "You feel like part of the mountain all right," he chided. "You've gotten chilled lying here so long. And stiff too, I shouldn't wonder. One of these days you're going to petrify right up and never move again."

Doreki laughed deep in her throat as his hands moved lower, massaging and caressing. "Not as long as you're around I won't, lover!" Indeed, her slim body seemed to come alive at his touch, till by the time he lifted her from the couch and bore her to the bed she was as warm and eager as he. Yet when at last she slept in his arms, her fair head pillowed against his chest, he lay wakeful for a long time, gazing over the white curve of her shoulder at the shapes in the stone garden. They were symbols of a language he could not comprehend.

# # # # #

Rynell was not sure what sent him down the trail to the humans' village a few days after Karuk's passing. The closest he could come to expressing it to himself was that he needed someone to talk to—which was ridiculous on the face of it, because there were plenty of people to talk to in Blue Mountain. Vareel, Aleera, Twillah, Doreki, all his friends would have been glad to find out what it was that kept him prowling through the halls like a mountain-cat in heat. Or Lord Voll: in his ramblings he'd encountered the Glider Lord more often than mere chance would seem to dictate, ready and waiting to be confided in. But that wasn't what he wanted. They were all too close to him; he needed somebody farther off. What he really wanted was to talk to Karuk, but he knew that was impossible. He still didn't understand the mystery of human death, but his experience of Karuk's last moments had left him with no shadow of doubt that his friend was gone beyond his reach. But maybe the presence of the human's tribefolk would help fill the emptiness Karuk had left behind.

The last time he came down this path he had been impatient, driven by anxiety. This time there was no impulse to hurry. He strolled, taking pleasure in feeling the rocky ground under his feet, the breeze stirring his hair, the sun on his face. A bright red bird flew over, its call-note like a pebble falling on bare rock. Under his arm he carried a haunch of meat from his latest hunt, a gift for Saya; the scent of it came warmly to his nostrils. As he drew near the humans' village the breeze brought him a whiff of wood-smoke and the high, shrill laughter of children.

Around a bend in the path in front of him three small children came running, two boys and a girl. One of the boys clutched to his narrow chest a ball stitched of scraps of hide. The other two were chasing him. As Rynell watched, the other boy leaped at the one with the ball and knocked him down. The ball went flying. The girl, laughing delightedly, sprinted after it and scooped it up. Then she saw Rynell and froze. Her eyes went wide and round as she stared up at the elf. Behind her the boys stopped scuffling and stared too.

"Greetings, little ones," Rynell said in the human tongue. The sound of his voice seemed to startle them out of their immobility. The girl shied like a scared rabbit, dropping the ball, and fled down the path. The boys scrambled to their feet and followed her in a twinkling of thin brown legs. Bemused, Rynell watched them go. He'd never considered himself any great beauty, but surely he wasn't that fearsome. But then, he remembered, children were easily frightened. Smiling a little, he stooped to pick up the hide ball before continuing on his way. The children wouldn't want to lose it.

He was unprepared for what he saw when he rounded the bend in the path and came in sight of the humans' village. People were rapidly gathering around the large central firepit where the tribe held their ceremonies and dances. A group of them already stood there looking in his direction; more were emerging from the caves. All their eyes fixed on him as he approached. Amid much murmuring one old man came forward. It was the elder who had come with Saya and her mate to bring him Karuk's message.

"Your presence blesses us, Honored One," the elder said, bowing with aged dignity. "How may we serve you?"

"Why, uh—that is, I—" Rynell looked around confusedly at all the wide-eyed human faces. At last he settled on one he recognized. "I came to see Saya." He held out the haunch of meat tentatively. "I have a gift for her. And I—" The rest of the sentence died away unspoken, overwhelmed by the respectful silence in which Saya came forward. She took the meat from his hand but did not meet his eyes.

"I thank you, Honored One," she said shyly.

"Saya!"

The woman caught the note of pained bewilderment in his voice and now she did look up. "Is something wrong, Honored One?" she asked, brows knitting anxiously.

"Will you stop calling me that!" he shouted, flinching as he saw her flinch. "Saya!" he pleaded. "You know me. I'm Rynell, your father's friend. How many times have I shared meat with you? How many times have Karuk and I sat by the fire in your cave, drinking spicebark beer and keeping you awake far into the night with our talk, till you pulled the hides over your head to shut out the noise? Have you forgotten who I am so soon?" His voice had risen again. The woman backed away one or two steps.

"Forgive me, gentle spirit, I never knew—"

"I am not a spirit!" He lunged forward and grabbed her hand hard. "Feel that! Flesh and bone!" He pressed the five-fingered hand flat against his chest. "A heart that beats, a body that breathes and bleeds and weeps, like yours!" He released the woman's trembling hand and turned to the widening half-circle of humans. "Are we so far apart?" He read his answer in the bewildered awe and fear in their faces. For all they comprehended of his outburst he might have been speaking his own language rather than theirs. This was distancing with a vengeance. This was not what he wanted. Why were they doing this to him? "Are there any here," he cried in despair, "who saw my people arrive at Blue Mountain?" Silence, while he scanned the humans' faces. A few were old, many aging—Saya, he noticed for the first time, had streaks of grey in her dark hair—but none were as old as Karuk. When the elder spoke he only confirmed Rynell's fears.

"I am the eldest here now that Karuk is gone," the old man said, "and I was but a babe in arms when the bird spirits came to inhabit the holy mountain."

_So all these people's lives,_ Rynell thought, _they have lived with the knowledge that we dwelt in the mountain—their holy mountain—but they have seldom seen us, from afar when the Chosen ride out or at an occasional exchange of gifts. Except for me, coming to see Karuk every so often but not paying much attention to anybody else. And I never seemed to age as they do—can they be blamed for thinking me and my people supernatural? No wonder they called him "Speaker to Spirits." How could I have been so blind, so selfish? Can I make up for it now? If I could just show them…_

A glimmering of an idea came to him as he searched the assembled humans' faces. Saya had drawn back into the crowd. Next to her stood a lanky youth with a strong resemblance to Karuk. The fair-haired young woman beside him was holding his hand tightly.

Rynell stretched out his hand toward the young man. "You are of Karuk's blood, are you not?"

The youth straightened proudly. "I am Yan, Bero's son," he said. "Saya Karuk's daughter is my mother."

"I thought so." Rynell smiled. "You have his nose." He raised his voice a little to be sure they all heard him. "Often did Karuk extend his hospitality to me, but it comes to me now that I never repaid him in kind. I would like you, Yan Bero's son, and your—mate?" He looked at the girl, who gave a little affirmative dip of the head. "—to come with me to my home in the mountain. There you will see something of how my people live and, I hope, strengthen the friendship between us. Will you come?"

Yan's dark face went bloodless. He swallowed hard and tightened his grip on his mate's hand, but he said, "Whatever the Honored One commands," and stepped forward. Saya made a little strangled sound of distress.

"I don't command," Rynell said, wondering at the young man's evident uneasiness. "I ask it in friendship. Nevertheless I do wish it."

"Then we will come, Jenna and I," Yan affirmed. He took the stone knife from his belt and handed it to his father who stood nearby. "Keep this for me," he said.

"That's settled, then. Good." The elf smiled, pleased at what he saw as a gesture of trust, and started to hold out his hands to the young human couple. Then he realized he still had the hide ball. "Oh!" He glanced quickly around. The little girl was clinging to her mother's skirt. He went over and fell to one knee in front of her. "I believe you dropped this," he said, offering the ball to her. She took it from him gingerly, round-eyed.

"What do you say?" her mother prompted her, awe temporarily supplanted by the need to mend her child's manners.

"Thank you," the little girl said shyly.

"You can use my name if you want," the elf encouraged her. "It's Rynell. What's your name?"

"Beena," said the child, then added, "Thank you, Rynell." She couldn't handle the final L sound too well, so it came out sounding more like "Rynehw." The elf laughed and tousled her hair.

"You're welcome, Beena," he said. Rising, he turned to Yan and Jenna. "Shall we go?" He saw with pleasure that they didn't seem quite so apprehensive as before as they followed him up the trail. He even thought he glimpsed a hint of curiosity in Yan's eyes. Well, if he was anything like his mother's family that wasn't surprising. Karuk probably would have jumped at the chance to see the inside of Blue Mountain. Rynell wondered why he'd never offered it.

"Did you know Karuk well?" he asked Yan.

"Not well, Honored One," Yan answered, "though as a boy I learned some of the Chants from him. He would take me fishing," he recalled. "He used to say that sitting on the riverbank waiting for the fish to bite was boring, and that repeating the same Chants over and over was boring, but that repeating Chants while you waited for the fish to bite passed the time."

Rynell chuckled. "That sounds like Karuk. Did you know him, Jenna?"

"Very little, Honored One," the round-faced girl said softly, with downcast eyes. "Only once—I had a dream that frightened me, of a huge black snake with a bear's head and eyes of fire. My mother couldn't tell me what it meant, so she took me to see the Speaker to Spirits. When I told him my dream he looked at me very hard and said, '_I_ will tell you what this dream means. It means that _you_ ate too many honeysweets the night before. Is it not so?' And he was right, I had. So then he patted my belly and said that no one ever got true dreams from eating honeysweets, so I shouldn't worry about it, just not be so greedy the next time." Rynell smiled. That sounded like Karuk too. It was good to know that such memories of him lived on in his tribefolk.

"Honored One—" Yan ventured.

"Please, Yan, Jenna, call me by my name. I'm not made for high-sounding titles. Come on—if Beena can do it, you can. Now if we meet Lord Voll you can use the title on him. He'd probably like it."

"Lord Voll?" Rynell had used the elf-word for Voll's title; Yan stumbled a bit over the syllables. Rynell searched his mind for a human-language equivalent.

"Our—uh—Chief Elder." A more literal translation would have been "Provider," but he didn't think the humans would understand that as well. "Our leader," he clarified. As he spoke of Voll he felt a twinge of unease. He wasn't sure what the Glider Lord would think if they met him. But they were nearing the head of the path. He pushed his qualms aside. "Here we are," he told the humans and sent his request to the doorkeeper.

Yan and Jenna gasped as the mountainside opened before them. He heard Jenna murmur "Magic!" and Yan stammered, "R-Rynell, how did you do that?"

"I didn't," he answered. "The doorkeeper did it. She is a rockshaper—she makes the stone move. Haven't you ever come with a gifting party? It's nothing to be alarmed at, any more than one of you pushing aside a door-hide. Come on." He beckoned. With one longing backward glance they followed him through the tunnel into Blue Mountain.

As they passed into the entrance hall he sent, **Doreki, are you on door duty again? I thought it was Ekerrin's turn.**

**It was, but he had something else he wanted to work on and asked me to take it. I don't mind. I like it.** Then she spotted the humans. **Rynell, what in the world—?**

**They're my guests. They're visiting,** he told her. Turning to the humans, he said, "Yan, Jenna, this is the doorkeeper, Doreki. She is one of our rockshapers and a special friend of mine." He'd once spent an entire evening explaining to Karuk the intricacies of lovemating, lifemating, and Recognition, and how they differed from human customs; he didn't want to go into it now. "Doreki," he went on, in elvish this time, "this is Yan and this is Jenna." The two humans stared up at the slim blonde elf whose trailing sleeves and skirts seemed to flow into the surrounding stone of her high alcove. She stared back with mingled curiosity and apprehension. When they bowed to her, however, an amused smile touched her lips.

"Why don't you show them how you close the door?" Rynell suggested. Doreki nodded, then her face went blank. The hole flowed together. The humans started and looked at each other fearfully, but when their guide headed up one of the stairways leading off the entrance hall, they hurried after him.

Rynell was debating in his mind whether to take them up to see the aeries first or some of the inner halls when he heard Jenna say, "Honored—I mean, Rynell?" Her voice shook; it sounded as if it had taken all the nerve she had to speak.

"What is it, Jenna?" he asked, wondering what was bothering her.

"Are—" She took a deep breath, then plunged on, "Are we going to see Karuk?"

"What!" He stopped dead, turned and stared at them. "No! What gave you that idea?" Then he remembered what Karuk had told him about the belief that the souls of dead humans went to dwell with the bird spirits. The light dawned. Skyfire! No wonder Yan had been spooked by his invitation. Rynell felt like laughing and cursing at once. Poor Yan! To be bidden to enter the halls of the dead at his age, when his life was just beginning… It had taken courage to accept. He looked at the young man and his mate with new respect. Then he laid his hands on their shoulders and looked into their eyes. "Yan, Jenna, listen to me. This is not a place of the dead," he said earnestly. "Where the souls of humans go when they die I don't know, but it is not here. If I'd known you thought _that_, I'd have explained earlier. This is just a place where people live, my people. You are my guests here," he added. "I will let nothing harm you." At that they looked reassured. Among the humans the codes of guest-friendship were sacred, as he had learned from Karuk. He hoped he could live up to them. "Well, come on," he said, releasing their eyes and turning up the stairs, "you won't see anything if we stand here on the stairs all day." This time they followed him a good deal more eagerly.

He decided against the aeries. Thunderwing was a temperamental bird; she had been known to snap out even at other Chosen. No telling how she'd react to humans. Besides, he hadn't cleaned her perch in a while. Some of the inner chambers, then. When the stairway branched he took the left-hand way.

They had almost reached the top of the stairs when a tall, slim form in a wing-shouldered tunic stepped out of the corridor beyond, the torchlight behind him picking out golden gleams from his light brown hair. It was Tyldak. He saw Rynell first and moved aside a little to let him pass, nodding a greeting. Then he spotted Yan and Jenna and started violently. **Humans! What in the name of the Storm are _they_ doing here?** His sending prickled with outrage.

**Visiting,** Rynell sent back, trying to project calm, though Tyldak's reaction roused an answering irritation in him. **They are my guests, as I have often been a guest in their village.**

**Guests? Humans? Are you out of your mind, Rynell?** Almost unconsciously Tyldak moved to block the corridor entrance. **Does Lord Voll know of this?** he asked suspiciously.

Rynell's temper flared. **No, he does not! Lord Voll may have chosen _me_—" He felt Tyldak recoil mentally from the sting of the implied slight. "—but he does not choose my friends. This is my home as well as his, or yours, and I will bring into it what guests I please. Now stand aside!** Tyldak's jaw set mutinously and for a moment they locked eyes, but the fire in Rynell's hazel ones defeated him. Scowling, he dropped his head; then, pushing past the other elf, he hurried down the stairs. Yan and Jenna shrank away from him and he likewise avoided their touch.

"He—he doesn't like us being here," Jenna said in a small voice. Rynell wondered if she'd picked up any emotional fallout from the confrontation, but he decided that the expression on Tyldak's face was enough to tell her that much.

"Is he your enemy, Hon—Rynell?" Yan asked.

"No," said Rynell, looking down the way Tyldak had gone and remembering many shared flights. "A friend, I would have said. At any rate he is no threat to us. I am stronger than he." The young man nodded, satisfied. Strength was something he understood.

They continued up the last few stairs and through a short corridor lit by a flame in a bird-shaped bracket. Beyond, the passage opened out into a vast cavern. Rynell heard the young humans gasp as they stepped out of the tunnel behind him.

Natural forces had begun the shaping of this soaring space, easily six hands of elf-heights from floor to ceiling, but the powers of the Gliders had molded it as well. Not to symmetry: it kept the irregular outlines of its origin, though the floor had been leveled and paved with smooth stones. Passages opened out from it in several directions. Ornamented pillars of harmoniously various sizes and groupings supported a lofty gallery off which more portals led. Above the level of the gallery, niches had been hollowed in the vaulted roof to make an airy webwork of stone. All the shapes were fluid, organic, as if they had grown there, but at the same time they showed the imprint of the artistry of thinking minds. That artistry was not yet satisfied. Here and there rockshapers stood, or sat with feet dangling, or hovered in midair, while stone flowed beneath their hands.

Not far from the entrance where Rynell and the humans stood, a sculpture rose from the floor. "Rose" literally, for it depicted in a succession of three forms a great bird taking flight. The sculpture had been taking shape for over a moon. Such a large mass of stone could not be molded all at once; further, the Gliders liked to savor their artistry. Rynell had been watching its progress with interest and approval, for it spoke eloquently to his sensibilities, but he hadn't yet discovered who the sculptor was. Now he saw a figure perched on the neck of the topmost bird-shape like one of the Chosen mounted. The smooth black cap of hair identified it as Ekerrin. Well, that was a surprise. He wouldn't have thought the taciturn sometime-doorkeeper had it in him.

Ekerrin also spotted him. Rynell saw him wave. Then he scrambled off the top of the sculpture, floated to the ground, and stepped quickly toward them. "Rynell, could you spare me a few moments? I'm having a problem with—" He stopped and one eyebrow went up. "What's this? Humans?" His tone was curious but not unfriendly. Rynell took advantage of that to introduce his guests.

"Yes, these are Yan and Jenna, friends of mine," he said in a casual tone. "I thought I'd show them something of how we live for a change."

"Oh. Well, they certainly seem to be impressed." The young humans stood with their mouths open, staring around and up at the immense cavern as if unable to believe their eyes. Jenna was hanging on to Yan's arm. "I suppose if you're busy—" Ekerrin said diffidently.

"Oh! No, not exactly. What is it you need help with?" Rynell was so grateful to the rockshaper for taking the humans in stride that he felt he owed him a favor. Besides, Yan and Jenna could probably use a few moments to get their wits back. "Stay here," he told them. "Ekerrin wants to speak to me about something, but it shouldn't take long. Will you be all right?" Yan retained enough presence of mind to nod.

Ekerrin led Rynell up to the base of the sculpture. "The line of the wing there is bothering me," he said, pointing. "It doesn't seem right somehow, but I can't quite feel how it should go. You are of the Chosen, you know the great birds, so I thought perhaps…"

"Yes, I see what you mean. Let me take a closer look." Rynell rose into the air with the rockshaper beside him. "It's too flattened," he told Ekerrin. "The wing curves to catch the air, so—" He formed an image of Thunderwing mounting the winds, felt the play of muscle, bone and pinion against the pressure of the airs as he had often done in rapport with the great bird, and sent it to Ekerrin. The rockshaper's broad face split into a grin.

**Ah, _yes_! Now I have it.** He darted over to the huge stone wing. Under his skilled fingers the desired curve took shape. **Yes, yes, that's done it! The rising up, the release, the victory over the pull of the world—** He turned back to Rynell, eyes shining. **_You_ understand, don't you? I could feel it.**

**Yes, I suppose I do,** Rynell answered. He looked at the sculpture again. **I hope this will make others understand too. Well, I'd best get back to my young friends.** With that he lowered himself to the floor, Ekerrin's thanks and their shared vision a warm glow in his mind.

Yan and Jenna stood where he had left them, but now they were staring at him. "You never told us you could fly!" Yan said wonderingly.

Rynell started to say, "I can't," for in the Gliders' minds gliding and flying were two distinct activities of which elves did one and birds, insects and Preservers the other. But he realized in time that the humans, who did neither, wouldn't necessarily make that distinction. "Many of us can," he told Yan. "I thought you knew that." He was sure Karuk had known it. He wondered how much knowledge got lost between human generations. Was it in such gaps that wild stories, like Blue Mountain being an abode of the dead, had room to grow? One of these days he should sit down with Yan and find out just what he did believe about the "bird spirits." For the moment, however, he would be content with banishing that look of bewildered awe from the young human's eyes. A hall full of rockshapers, he saw now, was not the place to bring the humans if he wanted to find common ground with them. He had a better idea.

"How about something to eat?" he asked and was rewarded by seeing both humans' faces brighten. "Then we can find a quiet corner somewhere and talk. Come on, this way." He led them across the cavern and through another archway on the far side. Then came a short stairway going down, a few smaller caverns and passages. They met nobody until they came to an antechamber just before the dining hall. There Rynell paused to let the humans examine its elaborate ornamentation at close range, thinking perhaps what they could touch might not seem so strange. While they were doing so, three Preservers came winging in from the hall beyond.

"Ooo! Bigthings!" shrieked one. A moment later they were fluttering and darting around Yan and Jenna in a bewildering whirl of bright colors, chittering and spitting blobs of wrapstuff. The terrified humans clung to each other and cowered.

"Stop that!" Rynell roared, as he tried desperately to identify individuals amid the confusion of wings. "Starbright, Winkle, Flowercap, quit it!" The multicolored swirl immediately transferred its attentions to him, resolving into a triangle of hovering sprites in front of his nose.

"Birdrider Highthing not want chase away nastybad bigthings?" queried Winkle, a look of deep perplexity on its tiny lavender-blue face.

Rynell shook his head firmly. "Absolutely not! These are friends. Be polite and say hello."

The Preservers still looked dubious, but after taking refuge on Rynell's head and shoulders they consented to wave vigorously at the humans and shriek "Hello! Hello! Hello!" Yan grinned and Jenna laughed outright, reaching a hand toward the butterfly-winged creatures.

"What are they?" she asked Rynell. "They're beautiful!"

"What bigthing say?" Winkle demanded, peering down into Rynell's face from atop his head.

"She says you're beautiful," he told it, "which you are, when you're not making pests of yourselves. We call them Preservers," he added to Jenna in the human tongue.

"Winkle beautiful!" shrilled the Preserver, throwing out its minuscule chest pridefully and spreading its blue-shaded wings. "Nice bigthing say so!" It hopped off Rynell's head and darted over to hover in front of Jenna. When she put out a tentative hand it landed on her wrist. "Hello! Hello! Hello! Nice bigthing like Winkle?"

"I think you've made a conquest, Jenna," Rynell said, grinning.

"Winkle sing for nice bigthing?"

"Uh, no, not right now," said the elf hurriedly. "Shouldn't you three be somewhere?"

"Starbright and Flowercap go," Winkle said loftily, waving a hand at its companions. "Winkle stay with nice bigthing." It left its perch on Jenna's wrist and fluttered up to sit on her head. "Go 'way!" it told Starbright and Flowercap. "Winkle say so!" The other two Preservers flittered off. Winkle settled itself comfortably in Jenna's hair as the two humans followed Rynell into the dining hall.

"The Preservers are our helpers," Rynell explained to Yan and Jenna as they crossed the hall. "Voll sometimes calls them the 'faithful ones,' though I'm not sure what he means by that. He is Firstborn among us and knows more about our past than the rest of us. But there are some things that are mysteries even to him. Much was lost or forgotten during our Wandering Years, but the little winged ones never deserted us. Ah, here we are."

The room they entered was long and low, with a big fireplace at the far end. Along the left side ran shelves laden with pitchers, mugs, tall goblets, bowls, platters, and various other vessels. Below them a wide counter had been drawn from the wall of the cavern. From the opposite wall sprang stone growths like tree branches. Upon these and from the ceiling above hung a myriad of what looked like oversized cocoons of various shapes. In one corner stood several tall stone jars. In another a basin brimmed with fresh water. Rynell immediately crossed to the shelves and lifted down a large wooden tray. On this he set a wide shallow bowl, a platter, three mugs and a tall pitcher. Then he took a knife from a rack and began to cut slices from a half-demolished roast that stood on the counter. At that point Jenna hurried over to him. "You shouldn't be doing that, Hon—Rynell. Let me."

"What, shouldn't I serve my guests? Well, all right. You can do this while I get us some fruit." He handed her another knife, then picked up the bowl and crossed to the other side of the room, throwing over his shoulder, "Winkle, come here. I'll need your help." The Preserver left off watching Jenna carve meat and fluttered after him. While Yan looked on, fascinated, the elf selected one of the dangling cocoons and slashed an opening in it. Reaching into the silken bag, he tumbled several ripe apples from it into the bowl, then went on to another while the Preserver sealed up the cut he'd made. The next cocoon held firm brown pears, the third a rough-skinned orange-red fruit that Yan had never seen before. The fourth yielded honeysweets; Rynell grinned at Jenna's unsuspecting back and filled up all the chinks between the other fruits with the sweet yellow berries. He was carrying the laden bowl back to Jenna when voices approached from the dining hall.

"—sorry to disturb your meditation, but I came in to make an herb potion for Kureel—sour stomach again—and I noticed it had gone out. I think the flue may need—oh my!" Rynell turned and saw Twillah in the doorway. Her soft earth-brown hair was bound up in the braided crown she wove it into when she needed it out of the way, and she wore a loose robe that was spattered with reminders of previous herbal concoctions. She looked at him and the humans in amazement. Behind her stood the tall figure of Shain the firemaker, his red-gold hair like an aureole of flame around his thin face.

"Hullo, Twillah," Rynell said a trifle apologetically. "Don't mind us—we're just scrounging."

Twillah's eyebrows lifted in mock surprise. "Mind? Why should I mind?" She came a few steps into the room. Yan and Jenna looked at her curiously and bowed. She shook her head at Rynell. "Tyldak was babbling something about humans, but I found it hard to believe even of you." She looked hard at him. "Oh well, I suppose you know what you're doing, or think you do." Her brown eyes softened as she took in the young humans' wondering faces. "They look harmless enough. If you please, Shain?" She swept across the room with a ripple of her long robe. The firemaker followed her to the hearth. Rynell let out a long breath and set down the fruit bowl on the tray. Then he picked up the pitcher, went over to one of the stone jars and lifted off the lid. He was dipping the vessel into the golden liquid in the jar when he heard Yan gasp. He looked around quickly. The young man was staring at Shain where he knelt on the hearthstone.

"He just reached out—and fire bloomed under his hand!" Yan whispered. It seemed to impress him more than anything he'd seen yet.

"Yes, Shain is a firemaker," Rynell told him. "There are only a few of them left. It's not an easy talent to control." For once he could sympathize with Yan's awe. The elemental power and potential danger of firemaking had always held fascination and fear for him. He could hear the bright, searing energies underneath the quiet golden voice that responded, "My pleasure, healer," to Twillah's thanks.

He crossed back to Jenna with the pitcher. "That's enough for us, I think," he said as he set it on the tray with the fruit bowl and the platter of sliced meat. "Now for that quiet corner." He lifted the tray and carried it out, Yan and Jenna close behind.

Winkle reclaimed its perch on top of Jenna's head. As they walked back through the dining hall it began to trill loudly and off key. Yan winced, Rynell groaned, and even Jenna looked pained. "I said a _quiet_ corner, Winkle," the elf reminded it.

"Winkle not sing for nice bigthing?"

"No, not now. We want to talk. Perhaps later."

"Later soon?"

"_Later,_ Winkle!" The Preserver subsided and settled down to make itself a nest in Jenna's hair.

Rynell already knew the quiet corner he had in mind, a favorite spot of his that he called the Grotto. A quick walk through several large halls brought them there. After those vast spaces, the smaller cavern with its artfully sculpted waterfall and pool and its fur-padded stone couches seemed delightfully cozy. Rynell set down the tray at the edge of the pool. He motioned the humans to help themselves while he filled the mugs with the golden liquid from the pitcher.

"Amberwine," he told them as he handed them their mugs. "We make it with honey and fruit juices. It doesn't have as much of a kick as the spicebark beer I used to drink with Karuk, but I never could pry the recipe for that out of him."

"It's delicious!" Jenna said after a large swallow. "I _hate_ spicebark beer," she added emphatically.

When they were all comfortably settled on the fur couches and had made substantial inroads on the food and drink, Rynell asked the young humans, "Well, what do you think of my home?"

Yan took a slow sip of amberwine, then held the mug between his hands, staring into its golden depths as he answered. "It surpasses all my imaginings," he said. "I always knew that the dwellings of the bird spirits must be great and fair, but I never dreamed of wonders like these. Rock that flows like water and moves and changes like a living thing—folk that float upon the air and call forth fire with a touch—trees of stone that yield fruit at all seasons—and all so beautiful that I can hardly bear it."

"Yes, it is beautiful," sighed Jenna. "It would be worth it to die if one could come and dwell here and serve the bird spirits forever. But you have told us that is not so."

"It is not," Rynell said. "Nor are we spirits, as I tried to tell Saya. Surely you have seen that? We eat and drink," he held up his mug, "feel anger, joy, fear, love, as you do."

"Yet you master the very elements," said Yan. "You ride upon the storm, you make water, earth and fire do your bidding. Even the passing years do not touch you." There was an ache in his voice. "I look at you, at this your dwelling, and I can only wonder why you concern yourselves with us. Next to you we are little better than beasts."

"That's not true!" Rynell protested, dismayed. "That's not true at all. Yes, we have powers you do not. But we—" He paused for a moment, thinking hard. At last he said, "I guess the difference is _time_. I do not understand it well myself, but from some things Voll has said we are a very old race, older than this world, maybe. Certainly we did not arise here, but came from some other place. This world has diminished our power and we have lost much of our past, but still, what is left is the result of ages upon ages of development." He looked at Yan. "The difference between us is not the difference between intelligent creatures and beasts. Think of it rather as the difference between a child and an elder. Who knows? What we are now you may one day become. Or perhaps not," he added, thinking of Karuk. "Your people may tread a different path. Not all children grow up the same way." He smiled at the young human. "Does that help?"

"A little," Yan replied, smiling tentatively back, "though I am not sure I understand all you say. Unless you truly come from the spirit world, how could you come to be before the world was made? If you are not spirits or—or demons, what are you?"

Rynell sighed. "Karuk asked me the same question just before he died. The only answer I can give you is the one I gave him. We are friends. We wish only to live in peace with you. We have no desire to rule you even if we had the right. You need never fear us. I know that's not the answer you wanted, but—what's wrong, Jenna?"

The girl was staring past him with her mouth open. Atop her head, Winkle was looking the same direction with a similar expression. "Ooo!" it said in a tiny voice. "High-highthing much vexed!"

Rynell turned quickly to find Voll standing behind him with folded arms. His flowing cloak and the winglike shoulders of his tunic accentuated the sense of presence he radiated. The Glider Lord was not given to overt displays of anger as a rule, but Rynell could tell from his stance and a certain tightness around his mouth that he was not pleased.

"Rynell," he said quietly, "what is the meaning of this?"

Rynell quickly rose, hoping Yan and Jenna would take their cue from him and do likewise. He wished fervently that the humans could receive a locksending. A little bowing and scraping on their part might not come amiss at this point, but he dared not prompt them openly. Still he answered Lord Voll calmly enough. "The meaning, my lord, is simply that I wished to repay some of the hospitality I have often received in the humans' village. Does this meet with your displeasure?"

"Did you consider my displeasure when you brought them here?" The words were as soft and cold as falling snow.

Rynell flushed. "My lord, I confess it was the impulse of a moment. But surely—"

"Blue Mountain is not a place for humans. They must leave at once."

"My lord!"

"I will brook no argument, Rynell. You will obey me in this." Hazel eyes met grey and read in them an immovable determination. The younger elf dropped his gaze.

"Very well, my lord." He turned to Yan and Jenna. They were on their feet, watching the two elves with apprehension.

"Your chief is angry. He does not want us here," Jenna said before Rynell could say anything. The tremor in her voice wrenched at his heart. _No, no,_ he wanted to cry out, _not the fear again! Don't set that wall between us after I've worked so hard to breach it!_ He did not dare speak lest it all come pouring out. Instead he nodded. Then as a final desperate gesture he reached out his hands to the young humans. An aching moment passed before his gesture was answered. Then his right hand was clasped by Yan's lean brown one, already callused with labor, and his left by Jenna's softer fingers. Thus joined they passed out of the Grotto into the entrance hall. Voll walked behind them; Rynell could feel his disapproval even with his back turned.

**Doorkeeper, open,** the Glider Lord sent. Doreki was quick to obey. The mountainside parted, letting in the scents of evening. **Rynell, stay here. I must have words with you.** Reluctantly the elf let go of the humans' hands. With a last look back they ducked into the tunnel. As they did so, Winkle detached itself from Jenna's hair and hovered in the opening.

"Nice bigthings going away!" it piped mournfully. "Come back sometime? Winkle sing for bigthings, nice?" There was no response. Yan and Jenna disappeared through the tunnel. After a few moments Voll sent, **Doorkeeper, close.** The door in the rock wall vanished, shutting out the night breeze and the first few early stars.

Rynell's control snapped. He whirled on Voll, hands clenched at his sides, a flame of anger in his eyes. **My lord, that was unfair!**

**Agreed. But necessary.** The thought was calm but unshakable. Voll turned and began to walk back to the Grotto.

"Necessary!" Rynell raged, striding after him. "To send those two harmless young people out of here without a word of explanation or apology? To treat them as if they were worms you'd found in your fruit? I brought them here so they could come to know us. I wanted them to learn that we are their brothers, not some sort of godlings they should bow down and worship. I'd begun to overcome their fear of us, win their trust. They were beginning to understand. I could feel it. And then you—you—"

"—came just in time, it seems," Voll replied. "Did you take any thought, any thought at all, Rynell, as to the consequences of your actions? You speak of winning the humans' trust, but your own seems to be given very lightly. Have you forgotten how dangerous humans are? Do you not remember how many of our kind they have slain?

**Remember!**

From the Glider Lord's mind flashed the image of the Great Storm, the fall of the Palace of the High Ones. The Firstcomers, shaken and confused, emerged to confront humans for the first time. They extended the hand of friendship and received death in return. Slender bodies lay broken and lifeless, their blood staining human weapons. The remnant fled, pursued by the creatures who had slain their kin.

**And still they hunted us; down the years they slew us time and time again. Think of Elmir, think of Ohrit and gentle Kerain, and then tell me again that we are their brothers.**

Voll's onslaught of images, delivered not with anger but with a deep sorrow, left Rynell pale and trembling, with tears in his eyes, but he faced the Firstborn squarely, chin lifted, as he replied. "My lord, we must not let past fears and enmities bind us. Can you not see that it is fear that has been the culprit all along? Those first humans struck out at us because they were afraid, afraid of what they did not understand. Ever since then fear has stood between us, breeding hatred and preventing understanding. But here, now, we have a chance to put all that behind us, to reach out the hand of friendship to humankind and have it clasped in return rather than clubbed aside. A chance to do what the High Ones attempted from the first and to succeed where they failed!"

"Noble sentiments, Rynell—though I wonder how much of this occurred to you before now. I've seen your fascination with the humans. I was willing to accept it so long as you put only yourself at risk. But now you bring humans into our very stronghold, imperiling us all. That I cannot permit. I do not refer only to your actions today. This notion of yours to help the humans 'understand' us holds grave dangers. To my mind, fear of the kind these humans have of us is a good thing. As long as they are in awe of us—believe us to be powerful spirits—they will never attack us. Once they lose that fear, once they know us to be vulnerable, what will keep their savagery at bay?"

"Love, my lord," Rynell answered, "love for love given. The same force that prompts Thunderwing to do my bidding instead of tearing me apart like a rabbit."

"You think that humans would be as easily mastered as the great birds? Even that was not easy."

"No! That's not what I mean at all. I don't want to master the humans. In a way we've done that already, and it's wrong. They worship us. They shouldn't be doing that."

"As I recall," Voll remarked dryly, settling himself on one of the Grotto's stone couches, "when we arrived here they were worshipping a mountain. Is that any better?"

"Perhaps it is. A mountain would mind its own business and not make any demands on them."

"We need not make demands on them either, Rynell. In fact, it might be better for all concerned if we simply left them to their own devices. We bear them no ill will, certainly, but we have no real need of them. We have more than enough resources in ourselves. Let the humans worship us from afar if they will. It will keep us the safer and do them no harm. We need have no further contact with them."

"So—wall them out of the holy place and wall ourselves in, is that it? My lord, we can do better than that for ourselves and for them. From my own experience I know that friendship with a human offers inestimable rewards. New insights, the sharing of knowledge, a look at the world from a completely different point of view … it's an enlargement of your very soul. Can't you see? This is a chance for both our races to become something greater than we could ever be alone."

"Chances, chances! You speak of possibilities, Rynell, and for you the possibilities may be attractive. I have observed that of my Chosen you have the most complete bond with your mount. You are gifted in such things. But how much of a chance would Tyldak, say, have of entering into the friendship you speak of? I am Lord of the Gliders. I must think of the welfare of all our people. We are few and we increase slowly. The loss of even a single individual diminishes us. If we are to survive in this harsh world we cannot afford to take the kind of risks you propose. No, I will hear no more protests!" His uplifted hand cut off Rynell's reply. He rose from his seat. "Take time to think on what I have said. Until I give you leave you are not to go to the humans' village nor speak with any of them. Consider it a punishment, if you will, for your actions today, though I do not mean it to be entirely so. You need time to recover from the death of your human friend. It is plain that affected you deeply, more than I realized at first." He laid a hand on the younger elf's shoulder and gazed into his eyes. "Come, Rynell, son of my spirit, you know I want only what is best for you."

"I have never questioned your love, my lord," Rynell replied quietly, "only that you necessarily know what is best." Turning his eyes from Voll's, he slipped from under his hand and walked away, head bent in thought.

# # # # #

Rynell crept out of bed as quietly as he could so as not to wake Doreki—though if she hadn't been roused already by the tossing and turning he'd been doing, he reflected wryly, she was unlikely to be disturbed now. He didn't usually have this problem, but tonight an uneasy restlessness gripped him and sleep would not come. Too much mental activity and not enough physical was a possible explanation. As Voll had asked, he had been thinking deeply about their conversation. Nor had he been outside Blue Mountain for several days. Yet that was not enough to explain the sense almost of foreboding that kept him from his rest.

He picked up the worn and comfortable leathers lying flung across the fur couch and slowly drew them on. The stone shapes in the darkened "garden" seemed menacing, as if they harbored some baneful secret. He turned his eyes away from them and gave himself a mental shake. He'd go down and make himself a hot drink, he decided—amberwine, with a little drowseleaf in it if he could find any. That should relax him and banish these imagined horrors.

A short walk through a torchlit passage brought him out on the gallery of the hall where Ekerrin's sculpture stood, completed at last. He paused to gaze at it, leaning over the ornamentally shaped stone balustrade. The lines of it caught at his heart. The rockshaper's art had succeeded in embodying what he had expressed to Rynell: "the rising up, the release, the victory over the pull of the world"—in a word, freedom. The shape of his desire.

At length he became aware of another presence in the great hall, a tall, slim figure partly obscured by the shadows beyond the sculpture. Tyldak: his stance revealed that he too was studying Ekerrin's work with yearning intensity. "Tyldak!" Rynell called down to him impulsively. "Care to come flying with me?"

The other elf looked up, startled. "What, now?"

"Why not?"

"It's the middle of the night!"

"I know. I can't sleep. Neither can you by the look of it. Some fresh air and starlight will do us good. Unless you have other plans?"

"No, no, not at all." Tyldak smiled uncertainly.

"Well, let's go, then." Rynell vaulted lightly over the balustrade and floated to the floor of the hall.

"Thunderwing isn't going to like being waked up," Tyldak predicted as he followed Rynell out.

"We'll nip through the dining hall first and get her a tidbit," Rynell said. "That will placate her. Ruled by her appetites, she is." Both elves laughed. Rynell was glad their confrontation on the day of Yan and Jenna's visit seemed to have left no permanent rift.

As it turned out Thunderwing was wakeful too. Her huge black silhouette against the starry sky shifted from foot to foot and made small querulous noises to itself. She was inclined to be snappish, but the freshly skinned rabbit carcass he had brought her soon mollified her. When Rynell began to strap on her flying harness her churrings were merely puzzled rather than irritated.

The night breeze blowing into the aerie was chill. Rynell slipped into a fur-lined vest and dug out a spare one for Tyldak. He also put on the fingerless gloves he sometimes wore for riding. After making sure her harness was secure, he floated up and settled himself on Thunderwing's back. He touched her mind briefly to find out if she would be amenable to a second rider, then signaled Tyldak to mount behind him. When the other elf's arms were clasped firmly around his waist, he leaned forward. "Now, my beauty—let's fly!" The great bird spread her wings and dropped from her stone perch. There was the usual momentary sensation of falling before the huge pinions grabbed air, pushed against it, swam through it into the night sky.

Only a short flight, Rynell told himself. The great birds were strong fliers, but Thunderwing carried two, and at night there were no thermals to assist her. One sweep around the mountain, then. At his direction Thunderwing banked into a wide curve. He leaned into it, gripping the harness, his fingers buried in soft feathers. Tyldak held on a fraction tighter and leaned with him.

The night air, cold and pure as spring water, splashed against the elves' faces and flowed through their hair. The woods below were dark and formless, but above them the stars shone piercingly bright in the blackness of the sky—swarms of stars, impossible to number. No mist or cloud obscured them, no moons rivaled them; the night was an unbroken canopy of lights from horizon to horizon. Rynell lifted his face to them in exultant wonder. Behind him Tyldak let out a whispered "Aaaah." Rynell's own heart was full. He felt as if he could leap from Thunderwing's back and plunge straight up into that starry sea to dance among those silver fires forever, free.

Once around the mountain. Reluctantly he called himself back from his ecstatic vision. They were rounding the mountain's shoulder, coming in sight of the humans' village. He could see lights there too, the ruddy lights of fires. There seemed to be a great many of them, more than he would have expected at this time of night. The sound of shouts came dimly to his ears. A ceremony of some sort? Curious, he urged Thunderwing lower.

Abruptly the realization came, a chill in his belly far colder than the night air. Those were not cookfires below, but torches. In the darkness humans shouted in anger, screamed in fear and pain. A battle. The humans, their humans, were being attacked.

**Rynell, no!** Tyldak's terrified sending stopped him and Thunderwing in mid-swoop, a swoop he did not remember making. As his head cleared a little from the red mist that had closed on it, he realized the other elf was right. He couldn't just go plunging in. He needed weapons. And more…

He urged all possible speed from the great bird as they winged back to the aerie. Thunderwing had not even landed when her rider sprang from her back, sending broadcast with all the power he could muster. **Awake! Awake! We are beset! Arm, arm and out! Chosen to me! Mount and ride! We are attacked!**

Not waiting to find out the response to his summons, Rynell dashed across the aerie and snatched up a handful of hunting spears. As he ran back to Thunderwing he felt Tyldak grab his arm. "Rynell, don't be a fool! You can't—" He flung the taller elf off and leaped onto his mount's back.

"Tell them what's happened, Tyldak. Send them after me!" With that he launched the great bird into the night once more.

At first the battle below was nothing more than a confusion of red lights, dark shapes and noise, but as he flew lower the elf's keen eyes began to decipher a pattern. The warriors of Karuk's tribe formed a rough semicircle with the village at their back. Against them surged a less organized mass of foes—also humans, he saw. The attackers were smaller on the whole and the defenders had the advantage of higher ground, but there seemed to be at least two or three times as many of the enemy. Bodies lay both inside and outside the battle line; from which side, whether wounded or dead, he could not tell. The villagers fought silently for the most part, with a grim determination, while their foes attacked with shrill ululating cries.

Thunderwing's scream rose over their yells as her rider urged her into the fray. Those ones below threatened the nest, he had communicated to her. It must be defended. She swooped down on them out of the night sky with talons outstretched. The huge claws tore one man's shoulder open and flung him to the ground. Another was struck in the back while trying to flee and fell flat, scored and bleeding. A third took Rynell's flung spear full in the chest. He crumpled, a look of astonishment fixed on his face.

A ragged cheer broke from the line of defenders. "The bird spirits!" they cried. "The bird spirits come to aid us!" Heartened, they struck out with renewed force while their attackers wavered. Some of the enemy fled, shrieking "A demon! A demon!" as the great winged shape passed over them, blotting out the stars.

Suddenly a deep, harsh voice called out from somewhere beyond the battle line. "Do not falter, warriors of Ghotharr! Did I not say to you that the cave-dwelling ones were allied with evil spirits? They must die! Forward, warriors! The spirits I command will protect you from the evil ones so long as your hearts are true and filled with valor. Attack! Death to the demon-worshippers!"

"Death to the demon-worshippers!" many voices echoed him. The foe surged forward. Rynell, as he guided Thunderwing up and around for a second attack, tried to locate the rallying voice, but in the darkness and confusion it was impossible to pinpoint. As he searched them with his eyes, however, it came to him that he had seen these humans before. They were the same tribe that he, Vareel and Aleera had spotted on the northern hunting grounds days ago. He wasn't sure how he knew—size, bearing, dress, other clues he had subconsciously registered in his previous brief glimpse of them—but he was fairly certain they were the same. With a pang he wondered if he should have warned someone, Yan perhaps, of their presence; but at the time he had not thought of them as a threat. _Are we becoming too complacent in our mountain haven?_ he thought. _Or is the fault my own, as Voll would have it, that I give my trust too lightly?_

Wheel and attack, wheel and attack again. On his third pass he spotted Yan. The tall young human was using a club to fend off blows from a stocky ax-wielder while his other hand held a knife, waiting for an opening. Intent on the foe before him, he didn't seem to see the spearman coming up on his flank. Rynell aimed and threw; his spear struck through the flanker's shoulder. The spearman's scream distracted the axman long enough to give Yan the chance he needed. His knife flashed out and the axman collapsed, clutching at a deep gash in his belly. Yan spared a glance upward, recognized Rynell, and grinned fiercely at him as he swept past.

Despite the young human's approval, the elf could tell that by himself he was making little impression on the enemy. After the initial shock they had mostly stopped running except to get out of Thunderwing's way. Only two spears remained to him. He cast a glance at the dark bulk of Blue Mountain. Where were the others?

A tumult of voices burst suddenly from behind him, cries of dismay from the defenders, triumphant yells from the attackers. As Thunderwing wheeled, Rynell saw that the enemy had broken the villagers' line at one point. A group of them raced toward the caves waving weapons and torches. But Karuk's tribe had not left their homes undefended. Out of the cave mouths and from behind concealing mounds of rock sprang many of the younger women of the tribe armed with spears and stone knives. The male warriors were the first line of defense, the elf realized, keeping the precious lifebearers from harm as long as they could, but if that failed the women were ready to fight for their homes and to protect their children. With a touch of his mind to hers, Rynell sent his mount winging to their aid.

Jenna stood near the mouth of Saya's cave, clutching a spear. As a foeman approached her she thrust it at him, but he danced nimbly aside. With a swing of his club he knocked the weapon from her hands. Before she could recover he grabbed her by the wrist and swung the club up for another blow. Rynell, too far away for a spearcast, ground his teeth and urged Thunderwing to greater speed. But the man's blow never fell. Seemingly out of nowhere streaked a tiny blue-winged shape and his face was instantly covered with white goo.

"Nastybad bigthing!" the Preserver shrieked angrily. "Mustn't hit nice bigthing! Nastybad! Nastybad!" The man dropped his club and clawed at his face, releasing Jenna. As Winkle darted around him, spitting wrapstuff and abuse, the human girl snatched up her spear and drove it with all her strength into her enemy's throat.

At the same moment Rynell felt the welcome touch of familiar minds. **We're here,** sent Aleera. **Where first?**

**Attack the ones who've gotten through into the village,** Rynell replied. **They're the most immediate threat.** He urged Thunderwing down. Stormcleaver followed. A moment later Fogfeather too dived on the attacking humans. It was too much for them. They panicked and scattered, falling easy prey to the great birds' claws and the weapons of Karuk's people.

But Rynell's joy at Aleera and Vareel's appearance soon faded. **Where are the rest of the Eight?** he sent to Vareel.

**Back in the Mountain,** his friend answered grimly. **When Tyldak told him what was going on, Voll forbade anyone to come to your aid.**

**We came anyway,** Aleera chimed in fiercely. **Kureel Sour-face tried to stop me as I was going to my aerie, but I taught him not to get in my way. _He_ won't be flying for a while unless he can do it standing up!**

**I'm not sure where we acquired Winkle or why it decided to come,** Vareel added. **Who can tell with Preservers? In any case, unless Voll changes his mind, we're it.**

Rynell reached out with the mental equivalent of a warm handclasp to each of them, a wordless expression of thankfulness for their presence. **Then we'll make do with what we have,** he told them. **Let's go.**

The appearance of two more "demons" coupled with the defeat of those who had broken through the villagers' line seemed to throw the enemy off balance temporarily, but it was not long before the voice out of the dark rallied them again. "Behold, my warriors," it shouted, "the cave-dwellers come to the end of their strength. In their desperation they summon more evil spirits to attack us. But we shall prevail! Fight on! Our victory is at hand!"

**Who is that?** Vareel sent to Rynell.

**I wish I knew. I've been trying to spot him. I have a feeling if we could get at him we might have a chance of ending this battle quickly. But it's still too cursed dark to locate him.**

**Not for long,** Vareel observed. **Smell the air—dawn will be coming soon.**

Rynell breathed deeply. It was true; he could scent the morning breeze. He wondered if sunrise would come soon enough to save the village—if anything could save it. He could feel Thunderwing's weariness and the fatigue dragging at his own body. The villagers had been fighting longer than he had. So had the enemy, of course, but with their greater numbers they could afford to rest once in a while and let others fight in their place. The defenders did not have that luxury. Already they had been forced back toward the village to close up the gaps in their line. Some of the women had joined the outer line of defense. Yan and Jenna now fought side by side. Grimly Rynell brought his mount around for yet another pass. He had expended a spear driving the enemy from the village. The last one, he told himself, he would save for that maddening voice in the dark.

The darkness was beginning to break, he realized. Ahead of him to the left he could clearly see Vareel's white hair like a shooting star above the dim grey shape of Fogfeather. Suddenly, sickeningly, the shooting star lurched sideways, then plummeted straight down.

"_Vareel!_" Rynell was off Thunderwing's back in an instant, arrowing through the air toward his friend. It took him a moment longer to register what had happened. One of the enemy had thrown something—a club, a stone axe, even a rock—and the impact had knocked the lightly built elf from his seat. Stunned or unconscious (Rynell refused to consider the third possibility), Vareel was unable to use his gliding powers to slow his fall. He hit the ground long before Rynell could reach him and lay in a crumpled heap. Several of the human warriors nearby yelled and started toward the fallen elf with raised weapons. But before they could get close enough to use them a great avian shaped dropped down, shrieking in fury. Fogfeather stood above his bondmate, his huge wings mantling over the huddled body as he lashed out at the humans with his terrible beak. The maddened bird seemed unable to distinguish friend from foe. Rynell, landing nearby, barely managed to dodge in time as Fogfeather struck out at him as well. He attempted to reach the giant hawk's mind to calm it, but found only a burning haze of rage and pain, impossible for him to penetrate. **Vareel!** he sent. From under the great pinions came a dim unfocused response. His friend was alive, at least, but for how much longer?

Aleera and Stormcleaver arrived a few heartbeats after Rynell. "Rynell, we have to get him out of here!"

"I know, but how? Fogfeather won't let anyone near him, curse it! I'm not sure even Voll could calm him now."

"Maybe if one of us distracts him—"

Another scream from Fogfeather interrupted her. Several of the humans seemed to be baiting the great bird, dancing about just out of his reach and jabbing at the terrible head with their spears. Rynell was forced to admire their nerve if not their good sense. He realized their strategy a moment too late. From Fogfeather's far side another spearman appeared, weapon poised. As Rynell dashed forward the human plunged the spear through the bird's eye. With a final shriek Fogfeather collapsed on top of Vareel's inert body.

In the next heartbeat Rynell and Aleera were among the humans, their spears darting snakelike in and out. Two of the warriors fell to the flickering points. The rest backed off as Stormcleaver and Thunderwing arrived to take up the defense. The elves sprang for Fogfeather's body. They heaved and pulled and finally dragged their companion from underneath the great bird. Vareel's white hair was matted with blood where he had been struck. More blood pooled under him where one side of his ribcage had been crushed by his fall. Blood bubbled redly from his mouth, speaking of further injuries within.

"Is he alive?" Rynell could hear the shudder of horror in Aleera's voice. Huntress though she was, Aleera had grown up in Blue Mountain. She had never witnessed violence like this.

"He's dying," he told her. He cradled the limp form of his friend carefully against his breast and bent over the pale, blood-smeared face. "Where is Winkle?" Then he locksent in anguish, **O Vareel, brother of my soul, do not leave me now!**

**…Rynell? … can't hold on … broken … pain … Fogfeather … so much pain…**

**Give it to me, my brother. Let me take the pain from you. Just hold on!** The star of his spirit reached out for the guttering flame that was Vareel's, but the wounded soul shrank from his touch.

**…no … don't want to give pain … hurt you…**

**My brother I beg you I am strong enough to endure it but if you die it will be more than I can bear give the pain to me and HOLD ON**

**…yes…** Accepting, Vareel's soul melted into Rynell's mental embrace as one wearied beyond endurance might collapse into a companion's supporting arms.

Rynell felt his body convulse. He clamped his teeth down on a scream as Vareel's pain flooded in on him: physical pain of splintered bones and ravaged flesh and ruptured organs, and the mental anguish of Fogfeather's death that felt as if something rooted in his spirit had been forcibly ripped away. _Oh High Ones it's too much I can't bear it / I have to Vareel will die / got to hold on just a little longer hold on hold on HOLD ON—_ The red searing pulsing moment stretched out tighter. It was almost on the point of breaking when the cool soothing touch of timelessness swept over it and washed it away.

Rynell's eyes and mind cleared. He knelt on bloodstained earth. Before him lay a long cocoon: Vareel's body swathed in wrapstuff. With the uncanny Preserver instinct for being where it was needed, Winkle had arrived. It and Aleera both hovered over him anxiously. "Are you all right?" Aleera's voice was sharp with worry. "What happened?"

"Never mind about that now." Rynell lurched to his feet and stooped to gather up Vareel. "You have to get him out of here, Aleera, back to the mountain."

"But what about you?" She touched his arm, the lines of concern deepening between her wide blue eyes as she searched his pain-marked face.

"I'll be all right. Don't worry about me. Just _go_!" Aleera did not argue further. Mounting Stormcleaver, she took the white-wrapped bundle from Rynell's arms and urged her bird into the lightening sky. Winkle went with her, perched protectively on the cocoon it had spun. As Rynell watched them go, weary in body and spirit, aching with the aftermath of pain, a voice obtruded itself on his consciousness.

"Well done, my warriors! The very demons of the evil ones fall to our weapons! They flee in fear from our might! Onward, and we shall conquer!"

Slowly the elf's gaze dropped and lighted unerringly on the source of the voice, unobscured now by darkness. The human stood on a small rise, well back from the battle line, not far from Rynell. He was not tall, this human, but thrawn and wiry, deep-chested and lean-hipped. Old scars seamed his flesh, but Rynell could not tell his age, for his face was overshadowed by a headdress made from the pelt of a longtooth cat. The great fangs curved down from brow to chin and the spotted fur flowed cloaklike behind. A necklace of teeth and bones showed stark against sunbrowned skin. The shaman leaped and danced and waved his arms insanely as he urged the warriors on.

All of Rynell's churning emotions—anger, grief, pain, weariness, confusion—focused on the human figure before him. He threw himself at the capering man, his one remaining spear forgotten behind him. Human warriors fell back from his path in terror, but the skin-clad shaman did not seem to notice him until the elf reached him, grabbed him roughly under the arms and shot straight up into the air with him.

Many lengths above the ground Rynell glared into his enemy's hate-contorted face. "You—human," he grated, shaking the man slightly. "Why have you come here? Why do your people attack my friends? Why?"

"Unhand me, demon!" the shaman screamed, writhing in the elf's grip. Rynell held on tighter.

"Not until you tell me. I must know why—why the killing, the hate? The world is wide. It has room for us all. Why do you slaughter my people? You are the one it comes from, human, this hate. You must know why. You must tell me. You must! You must!" His voice rose to a ragged shout. His whole body trembled with the intensity of the need to know the reason for his anguish. "You must tell me!"

"I will tell you nothing, demon! Go back to the place whence you came! In Ghotharr's name I command you!"

In sheer desperation Rynell locked eyes with the struggling shaman and thrust with his mind into the human's. The knowledge was there somewhere. He had to find it. The shaman's mind howled in rage and terror. His clutching hand found the hilt of his stone knife and he lashed out wildly at Rynell. The sudden pain as the blade gashed his side snapped the mental link. Rynell's slim body arched and his grip loosened. With a last twist the human won free and dropped. His trailing shriek of mingled fear and triumph cut off abruptly.

For his part Rynell felt no triumph as he hung in the air, though the growing daylight showed the enemy fleeing, dismayed by their leader's fall. The one thought pounding through his mind was, _He is dead and I shall never understand._ In his exhaustion and bewildered pain he was not sure if the thought was for the shaman, for Karuk, or both. _He is dead, he is dead and I shall never never understand, never, blood pain death hate suffering why? never know he is dead what is dead…_

Spiraling into blackness, he was barely aware of Thunderwing coming up beneath him, of his spent body collapsing along her soft back as she carried him away.

# # # # #

He woke to find Twillah bending over him, her dark eyes large and almost black in her wan face, her hair coming down in feathery streaks from her braided crown. She looked so strained and anxious that fear clutched at him.

"Vareel?" he forced out in a whisper.

"He's alive, Rynell," the healer assured him, her expression softening a trifle. "Winnowill and I managed to heal him. As for you—" She shook her head and gave him a quizzical half-smile. "I'm not sure whether to thank you for saving his life or to curse you for risking it in the first place."

"I'm not sure either," Rynell muttered. "Can I see him?"

Twillah looked stern. "You shouldn't move. You took a nasty gash yourself and we haven't had the energy to spare for it yet. Besides that, your own energies are low. I don't know what all you got up to out there, but you depleted yourself badly. If you take my advice you won't stir from that bed for the next three days at least."

Rynell found his body agreed with Twillah, but his mind was still not easy. "Just for a moment," he pleaded. "Then I'll rest, I promise."

"Well…" Twillah's eyes unfocused briefly as she sent to someone outside the room. "He's sleeping," she told Rynell. "I'll take you in to look at him if that will satisfy you. But just for a moment, and no sending!"

"Whatever you say, healer," Rynell said meekly.

Twillah eyed him with suspicion. "Now I _know_ you're not well. But I'll hold you to that. Come on then—don't try to get up too quickly. Lean on me."

Though tightly bandaged, Rynell's wound twinged painfully when he moved and his legs seemed reluctant to bear his weight, but with Twillah's help he managed to stagger down the short corridor that led to the room where his friend lay. It was small and dimly lit. Vareel's face among the high-piled furs was still almost as white as his hair, but it was peaceful, free from pain. His breathing was deep and even. Rynell felt as if a great weight had been lifted from him. He turned to the dark-clad figure who kept vigil in one corner of the room. "Thank you," he said.

Winnowill raised her eyes to his. They burned with anger in her drawn face. **What I did I did not do for you!** she lashed out at him. **Thoughtless fool! You could both have gone flying to your deaths for all I care, but Voll has lost enough.** The bitter force of her sending was like a physical blow. Rynell winced and swayed against Twillah, who cast a reproachful look at her senior.

"Winnowill, please! He is weak and ill. You can berate him all you want when he has his strength back. Come along now, Rynell. She is weary too," she explained in a low voice as they made their way back down the corridor. "The healing was difficult." Rynell, who sensed that Winnowill's fatigue had shown him more about the enigmatic healer than he had ever been able to see before, said nothing. He allowed Twillah to lead him back to bed and soothe him to sleep with a gentle touch.

# # # # #

The Lord of the Gliders had called Council. As Rynell made his way down the seemingly endless stairway that led to the Great Hall deep in the heart of Blue Mountain, he knew he had secretly dreaded this eventuality ever since the night of the battle. His partly healed wound still ached, an insistent reminder of pain dealt and pain received. There were deeper wounds too that a healer's magic could not reach. His spirit shrank from the thought of another battle, yet he knew that a bitter one lay ahead of him, one farther reaching in its consequences than any physical conflict. _High Ones give me strength,_ he thought. _I never wanted this._ Yet his own action had precipitated it, almost as if part of him did want it—the final challenge, the supreme test of what he truly was and believed. _Am I right to call on the High Ones for aid?_ he wondered. _Which side would they be on?_

The Great Hall opened out before him. It had been so named for its importance rather than its size, though it was impressive enough with its broad expanse of floor from which treelike pillars rose to a lofty ceiling. What drew the eye immediately was the dais at the far end with its high seat. Rynell gasped inwardly. He had not been in the Great Hall for a long time. While Voll's throne had been placed there from the first years of the Gliders' settlement, its elaborate ornamentation was new to him. Graceful bird forms flanked it now, and soaring arches of stone webwork had been shaped into the wall behind it. But what brought a strange chill to his heart was the huge form perched on the back of the throne. Starsweeper's bones … whose idea was it to mount them there, immense feathered wings outspread, eyeless hollows staring? It was a symbol whose meaning he could not read.

In the center of all this immensity sat Lord Voll. He should have been dwarfed by it; instead it enhanced him, as if he were the source from which it all sprang. On either side of the dais were gathered the entire population of Blue Mountain. They all looked at Rynell as he entered—friends, acquaintances, others he barely knew. He saw Vareel, the only one besides Voll who was seated; some thoughtful rockshaper had drawn a stool for him from the stone floor. He looked pale and drawn, but Rynell could read nothing else from his friend's face. Twillah stood behind her lovemate with her hands resting on his shoulders, her hair in a soft cascade down her back. Aleera stood near them. Elsewhere in the crowd he saw Doreki, Tyldak, Ekerrin. None of them spoke to him as he approached the dais and looked up at the Glider Lord. Voll's face too was unreadable.

Rynell bowed. "My lord Voll," he said formally, "I have come in answer to your summons. What is the purpose of this gathering?" _As if I didn't know,_ he added to himself.

Voll gazed down at him dispassionately and spoke in equally formal tones. "Rynell of the Chosen Eight, you have been called here to speak to this Council in defense of your actions of three nights ago, and to face the consequences thereof. On the night of which I speak, you entered into a battle fought between human tribes, contrary to my command to you to have no contact with the humans until I should give you leave. You also incited others of the Chosen Eight to enter into this battle, again contrary to my express command. As a result Vareel my sister-son lost his bond-bird and came near to death, and you yourself were wounded. What have you to say regarding these actions?"

"My lord," answered Rynell, "I did what I felt was necessary at the time for the protection of our people and for the succor of the humans who are our allies. If I acted in haste it was because the situation would brook no delay. As it was the humans were hard pressed and the victory was a near thing. By the time I could have consulted you in the matter it would have been too late."

The Glider Lord frowned slightly. "I question the necessity of embroiling any of our people in the humans' conflicts, or whether any threat to us was involved."

"Come now, my lord," Rynell said, surprised. "How safe would we be with a horde of fanatically hostile humans camped on our doorstep?"

"Safe enough," Voll answered, "little more in danger than we are at this moment. The aeries are inaccessible save by flight. We control the only other entrance to Blue Mountain. They would not be able to reach us."

"Perhaps not, as long as we stayed inside the Mountain all the time, but…" Rynell's voice trailed off as he realized that what sounded absurd to him might not be at all unthinkable to Voll. The Glider Lord took immediate advantage of his hesitation.

"I question whether you took any thought of our people's safety, Rynell. I suspect it was the humans' safety you were thinking of."

"And why not?" Rynell retorted, stung by the note of accusation in Voll's tone. "The humans are our friends. Should we not aid them in their need? Would you have us stand by and do nothing while they were slaughtered?" Yet that was exactly what Voll had ordered on the night of the battle.

"Death comes for all humans, Rynell," Voll answered, a little sadly, it seemed, "as you found out not long ago, whether they are slain by violence or not. With us it is otherwise. Why should we risk death to preserve mortal lives? It can only postpone the inevitable. In the end nothing is gained by it and the potential loss to ourselves is great. We are few compared to the humans. We replenish our numbers much more slowly than they. The loss of one life is a far greater blow to us than a hundred of their deaths would be to them. Or do you truly value the lives of humans above those of your own people?"

Rynell thought of Karuk with his wit and dry humor, of the courage and childlike wonder of Yan and Jenna, and felt anger rise in him. "I value _all_ life, my lord," he answered, his voice low but intense, "save life without honor. You weigh and measure and say 'This has greater value because it is more.' But I say to you that if we buy our own safety at the price of heartlessness, our endless lives are hollow and without worth. The humans welcomed us here years ago. Since then they have given us their devotion. Do we not owe them our friendship in return?"

"If we are to speak of debts," Voll said in a quiet tone with a hint of ice in it, "what of humankind's debt to us in terms of the many elfin lives their race has taken? We have never sought retribution for those lives. Revenge is not our way. But I question whether we owe anything to humans."

"When will you understand that _these_ humans are not _those_ humans?" Rynell flared. "They can't all be lumped together like animals that all behave pretty much in the same way. They're intelligent, thinking creatures like us—"

"No, not like us, Rynell," Voll cut in coldly. "They are unpredictable, as you say. More, they are violent. They attack what they do not understand. They slay their own kind. Ours is the way of peace. Would you make us like them? Would you plunge us into war and bloodshed for their sake? Is that your notion of 'honor'?"

"You're a fine one, Voll, to talk about attacking what you don't understand! What do you know about humans anyway? You sit there on your fancy perch with a mountain's weight of rock between you and them, and you presume to pass judgment on how the humans deal with their world. What right do you have to condemn violence, you who send others to do your hunting for you? You have to feel the bite of the knife in your own flesh to understand pain. You have to smell blood on your own hands before you can know what killing does to you. And you have to experience life in all its aspects, joy and suffering, beauty and harshness, loss and love, before you'll be able to see what makes survival worth fighting for, even worth dying for. The humans understand that. Do you?"

Voll's face had gone hard, his voice as icy as a wind from the Frozen Mountains. "You seem to forget that I led our people here, Rynell, after years of wandering in the wild. I understand many things. I understand now the world outside has corrupted you far more than I supposed. I understand that it holds nothing but pain, loss, and death for our kind. I understand that if we let it, it will diminish our once mighty race, the seed of the High Ones, to little better than beasts squabbling over bones. And therefore I reject it utterly." He rose suddenly to his feet, glaring down at Rynell, and his voice filled the hall. "Hear me all of you! From this day forth no Glider shall set foot outside of Blue Mountain, save those of the Chosen Eight who venture forth to seek our food and such other things as we must have. Above all, no Glider shall have any commerce whatsoever with any human. They have no part in what we are or what we shall become. The door shall be sealed between us and the world outside so that we may build a more perfect world within. We shall shut ourselves off from corruption and preserve the ways of the High Ones!"

In the stunned silence that followed Voll's pronouncement, Rynell felt his heart pounding and his head reeling with shock. He thought wildly, _He can't mean that!_ A glance at the Glider Lord's face told him that Voll did mean it. The immense avian skeleton above his head loomed over Rynell menacingly. _Bones … bones and death … the humans are right…_ The lofty ceiling seemed to press in on him, trapping him, cutting off his air, relentlessly squeezing the life out of him. A cage, a cage with no door, and Karuk's way was shut to him. He would be caged forever—

"No!" he screamed. Every eye turned to him. "I defy you, Voll!" he went on in a shout that flung itself against the walls of the hall. "I will not be bound by your restrictions or your fears! I shall go where I please, talk with whom I please, share friendship with whom I please! And if you try to stop me I shall resist to the last breath in my body, do you hear? I will not sit tamely in your stone cage for the rest of eternity—I will _not_!" His hazel eyes blazed at Voll; his slim body trembled with the force of his defiance.

Voll regarded him for a long moment. In his eyes was ice to match Rynell's fire. At last he said in a quiet, even tone that nevertheless could be heard by every elf in the hall, "Do you then reject the safety and protection of Blue Mountain?"

"I do."

"Then go!" The pronouncement was harsh as stone. "Leave these halls and never return. Rynell, once of the Chosen Eight, as Lord of the Gliders I banish you forever from Blue Mountain. Go to the arms of the world outside that you love so much. May you find there what you deserve."

If the Glider Lord meant to intimidate the younger elf into submission, he failed utterly. "Gladly!" Rynell spat. "Whatever the world holds in store for me, life or death, it can be no worse than the living death you mean to impose on those who follow you. Stay and wither in your hollow haven! I will have none of it. Gladly will I go and seek whatever fortune is mine." He turned and began to stride from the hall.

"Not alone." The clear, calm voice halted Rynell in mid-stride. He turned. Vareel had risen and was coming toward him. Rynell could tell it hurt him to walk; barely healed injuries slowed and stiffened his steps.

**No!** he sent in dismay. **No, my brother—you have suffered enough on my account.**

**My choice—then and now.** Vareel's sending was serene and sure. One eyebrow lifted a little. **Unless you do not want me?**

**O my brother, how can you doubt it? We shall go together then, you and I.** He reached out to grip Vareel's shoulder while his own was clasped in turn.

"I'm coming too!" Aleera marched up to them and stood with her arms folded as if daring anyone to say her nay. Rynell didn't bother, but reached out his other hand to her. She took it with a pleased smile and squeezed it.

"And I." Twillah glided up and slipped her arm around Vareel's waist. There were tears in her deep brown eyes, but her voice did not betray them as she added, "Someone has to take care of you reckless fly-by-nights."

"If you will have me, I wish to go as well." With surpise Rynell recognized Ekerrin's voice. Then he saw the rockshaper's sculpture in his mind's eye and understood.

"You will be welcome," he said. He raised his head and swept a challenging look over the assembled Gliders. "Are there any more of you," he called out, "who will choose exile over bondage?"

There was a sudden movement in the crowd, but not toward him. Winnowill stalked to the dais and stepped up to the high seat at Voll's right hand. She glared at Rynell and his companions, her lips tight with anger. After a moment Kureel followed her. They were soon joined by the rest of the Chosen Eight.

Most of the Gliders still stood in murmuring groups between the opposing poles. Rynell's eyes sought Doreki. For a moment she met his questioning gaze, then turned away with an expression of hurt bewilderment on her face. _No,_ he realized, _she does not understand._ Blue Mountain was her home. She belonged here as he no longer did. _Farewell then, my golden flower,_ he thought with a mixture of tenderness and regret. _Be happy in your garden of stone._

His gaze fell next on Tyldak. **Tyldak,** he sent to him privately, **if you wish to come with us you will be welcome.** Tyldak looked at him, startled. **You will never be free otherwise,** Rynell warned. For a moment Tyldak wavered. Then his face hardened.

**No!** he sent back. **I stand by Lord Voll!** He turned and strode up to the dais. As he did so, Rynell caught the tail end of a thought: _Perhaps now I will be Chosen._

As the moments stretched out tensely in the Great Hall, a few more Gliders detached themselves from the crowd to stand at one pole or the other. The rest stayed where they were, their inaction itself a choice. When all had chosen, some two hands of elves stood with the rebel.

At last Lord Voll spoke again. "Very well. Those who wish to shall go with Rynell. You may take what is needful, but you must be gone by sunset tomorrow. So it is decided." He bent his head. For a fleeting instant he seemed as weighed down by years as the humans' village elder. Then he raised his head again and the impression vanished. "This Council is at an end." He stepped down from the high seat and, taking Winnowill's hand, swept out of the hall without another glance at Rynell and his companions. Winnowill looked at them as she passed them, however, and Rynell thought he detected triumph in her eyes.

# # # # #

For the final time Rynell stood on the stone lip of his aerie, leaning against Thunderwing's feathered shoulder, and watched the sun rise over Blue Mountain. Below in the entrance hall his companions were finishing their packing. Voll had said they must leave by sunset, but they intended to go this morning so as to have the best part of the day to travel in. They still had no idea where they would go. Rynell had excused himself from the bustle for a while. He wanted one last look from the high place. He also had a final duty to perform.

He watched the golden light touch the mountaintop, then seep down to bathe the lower hills and flow into the humans' village. _Farewell,_ he told them silently. _Take care of yourselves, my friends and teachers. Remember my people with love even if we never meet again._ The sun flashed on the river and made the trees glow with green. The sky was turning blue and clear with a few puffy clouds near the horizon. He would never ride the skies again … but they would always be there above him in all their limitless beauty. He looked out on the world he was embracing and did not know whether to weep or rejoice.

"Rynell?" He turned quickly, wondering if one of his companions had come to hurry him along. He was astonished to see Lord Voll standing in the entranceway.

"Voll! Why—" He stopped, arrested by the grief now plain to read on the older elf's face.

"Rynell, I spoke in anger yesterday. I did not mean—I could not bear to think that my anger had driven you away. Son of my spirit, your exile is rescinded if you wish it."

Rynell looked at him for a long moment. Then he said carefully, "We both spoke in anger yesterday. Yet I do not think either of us said anything we did not believe to be true. Is it not so? You still intend to isolate our people from the world outside, do you not?"

"I do. But you are still of my Chosen. You would be free to ride the skies as you have always done. Will you not stay?" The Glider Lord held out an entreating hand.

Slowly Rynell shook his head. "No, Voll, it is not possible, not on those terms. If I took a freedom denied to others it would be hollow. It would poison my spirit. We have made our choices, for good or ill, and we must abide by them." He smiled crookedly. "I just don't think this mountain is big enough for both of us anymore."

Voll sighed. "Perhaps you are right. But at least we can part without anger."

"That, at least, I am glad of." Rynell moved forward to take Voll's hand and suddenly found himself in the older elf's arms, hugging him fiercely. **Farewell, father of my spirit. However far I travel your memory will always be with me. High Ones keep you!**

**High Ones watch over you, son of my spirit. As long as there are elves in Blue Mountain you will not be forgotten. Farewell!**

Rynell loosed himself gently from Voll's embrace. "And now … I have one more farewell to make." He moved back to Thunderwing's side. Laying a hand on her neck, he reached for her mind with his own. Strand by delicate strand he unraveled the bond between them, felt the fierce, keen instincts shake loose from their constraints. After so long a time it was like cutting away a portion of his soul, but it had to be done. Thunderwing too would be free. "There, lovely one," he whispered as the last of the bond faded, "the skies are yours. Go now!" he cried. "Fly!" He stepped back and flung up his hand in the signal for flight. The bird looked at him with a new, wild light in her eyes. Then she gave a shrill scream and launched herself into the air. She wheeled once around the mountaintop; Rynell, watching her, imagined he could still feel the wind beneath her wings. Then she was off toward the rising sun, climbing higher and higher till he could no longer see her against the glare and through the blur of his tears. When he turned to go back through the empty aerie, Voll too was gone.

As he walked slowly down the stairs to the entrance hall, he was met by a flutter of blue wings.

"Birdrider Highthing go away?" the Preserver asked curiously, alighting on his hand. "Winkle go with?"

Rynell smiled. "No, little friend, much as you would—er—enliven our journey. You have to stay here and take care of Lord Voll for me. Will you do that?"

"Yes, yes!" caroled Winkle. "Preservers keep highthings safe and sound!"

"I know you will. But one more thing…" Rynell paused, looking around, then lowered his voice to a conspiratorial half-whisper. "Don't let him forget. However long he buries himself in this stone womb, don't let him forget that there _is_ a world outside, that Blue Mountain is not all there is to care for. Sing to him of—of the Palace, the homeplace. Can you do that?"

"Homeplace! Homeplace!" shrilled Winkle, fluttering in excited circles around his head. "Birdrider Highthing want go homeplace?"

Rynell's heart lurched. It was possible… Then he shook his head. "No, Winkle, I think not. It would do no good now. We are bound to this world for the present. It is in this world that we must find our place. Someday someone may make that journey. But today—" He started quickly down the stairs. "The sun climbs the sky apace and we have far to go before nightfall."

**F I N**


End file.
